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COLLECTED POEMS 



THE COLLECTED POEMS 



OF 



WILLIAM WATSON 



(t 




JOHN LANE 
NEW YORK AND LONDON 

M DCCC XCIX 






Copyright, i8gst 1^94 
By Macmillan & Company 

Copyright, l8g4 
By Stone & Kimball 

Copyright, i8g6, i8g7, i8g8 
By John Lane 

Copyright, i8gg 
By John Lane 



••• : •: ••• 



The University Press, Cambridge, U. S. A. 



TO 

THE RIGHT HONOURABLE 
THE EARL OF ROSEBERY, K.G., K.T. 

THESE POEMS 

ARE COLLECTIVELY DEDICATED 

IN GRATEFUL MEMORY 

OF THE GENEROUS APPRECIATION 

WITH WHICH HE HAS ALREADY 

DISTINGUISHED THEM 



PREFATORY 

In preparing this Collected Edition of his 
poems the Author has excluded the whole of 
his earliest volume ^ " "The Prince's ^est " 
(1880); has omitted some three-fifths of his 
second volume, ^^ Epigrams'' (1884); and has 
included the greater part of the contents of 
all his subsequent volumes of verse, with the 
exception of the " Tear of Shame,' here repre- 
sented by a small selection, and " ^he Eloping 
Angels^' omitted altogether. 

^he seven sonnets here given, from a sequence 
of fifteen published in June 1885 under the 
title of^^ Ver Tenebrosum," need not be taken as 
in each case accurately reflecting his present 
opinions upon events of that year, but are re- 
tained for the sake of such purely literary 

vii 



PREFATORY 

interest as they may possess for certain of his 
readers. 

In a few other poems ^ widely separated in 
date of production^ and relating to matters of 
deeper import than that of political controversy 
or international affairs^ he can lay claim to no 
obstinate consistency of view ; and if some of 
his readers are disposed to regret that while 
he has grown older his faith has not become 
more buoyant^ he can only ask them to extend 
a kindly tolerance to one whoy even as they^ is 
sincere in his quest of 'Truth, 



Vlll 



CONTENTS 



PA6E 

"Wordsworth's grave 1 

shellbt's centenary . . . . , . . 13 

lachrtmje musarum . . . • , . . . 20 

to edward dowden 27 

EPIGRAM . . 31 

AUTUMN 32 

WORLD-STRANGENESS 35 

EPIGRAM 37 

THE MOCK SELF . 38 

ENGLAND AND HER COLONIES 39 

TO A POET 41 

"when BIRDS WERE SONGLESS " 42 

FELICITY 43 

IN LALEHAM CHURCHYARD 45 

LIFE WITHOUT HEALTH 50 

THE FLIGHT OF YOUTH 51 

EPIGRAM 52 

" UNDER THE DARK AND PINY STEEP " ... 53 

"nay, bid me not my cares TO leave" ... 54 

A PRELUDE 55 

ON landor's "Hellenics" ...... 56 

ix 



CONTENTS 

PAOB 

ENGLAND MY MOTHER 57 

" SCENTLESS FLOW'eS I BRING THEE '* ... 64 

SHELLEY AND HARRIET ....... 65 

" ARE THESE — ARE THESE INDEED " .... 66 

THE raven's shadow 67 

ANTONY AT ACTIDM 71 

THE GLIMPSE 72 

TO A SEABIRD 73 

"well he SLUMBERS, GREATLY SLAIN " ... 74 

LUX PERDITA 75 

"the things that are MORE EXCELLENT*' . . 76 

EPIGRAM 80 

THE GREAT MISGIVING 81 

TO LORD TENNYSON 83 

THE KEY-BOARD ,84 

AFTER READING " TAMBURLAINB THE GREAT " . , 86 

TO A FRIEND 87 

EPIGRAM 88 

SONNETS FROM " VEB TENEBROSUM " — 

THE SOUDANESE 91 

THE ENGLISH DEAD 92 

RESTORED ALLEGIANCE ...... 93 

GORDON 94 

FOREIGN MENACE 95 

HOME BOOTEDNESS ....... 96 

OUR EASTERN TREASURE 97 

NIGHTMARE 98 

ART 99 

THE LUTE-PLAYEB 100 

Z 



CONTENTS 

PA6B 

beauty's metempsychosis 101 

reluctant summer .102 

KEATS 103 

AT THE GRAVE OP CHARLES LAMB, IN EDMONTON . 104 

TO AUSTIN DOBSON ....*., 105 

LINES IN A FLYLEAF OP " CHRISTABEL " . , . 107 

A GOLDEN HOUR 108 

BYRON THE VOLUPTUARY . , . . . .110 

THE FUGITIVE IDEAL Ill 

COLUMBUS , .112 

TO JAMES BROMLEY 114 

THE SAINT AND THE SATYR 117 

« THY VOICE FROM INMOST DREAMLAND CALLS " . . 119 

THE CATHEDRAL SPIRE 120 

A DEDICATION 121 

THE DREAM OF MAN 125 

EPIGRAM 138 

VITA NUOVA 139 

THE FIRST SKYLARK OP SPRING 141 

NIGHT ON CURBAB EDGE ...... 145 

EPIGRAM 146 

ODE TO LICINIU8 147 

THE PLAY OF "KING LEAR " 150 

TELL ME NOT NOW 151 

THE FATHER OF THE FOREST 153 

EPIGRAM 164 

LINES WRITTEN IN RICHMOND PARK . . . .165 

THE SOVEREIGN POET . . . • , . .166 

THE RUINED ABBEY 167 

xi 



CONTENTS 

PAOB 

SONNET 168 

ODE TO ARTHUR CHRISTOPHER BENSON . . .169 

HYMN TO THE SEA 173 

EPIGRAM 183 

FRANCE 184 

A RIDDLE OP THE THAMES 185 

THE tear's MINSTRELSY 187 

A STUDY IN CONTRASTS 188 

TO RICHARD HOLT HUTTON 193 

EPIGRAM 195 

DOMINE, QUO VADIS ? 196 

TO AUBREY DE VBRE 202 

CHRISTMAS DAY 203 

TO A LADY RECOVERED FROM A DANGEROUS SICKNESS 204 

A NEW NATIONAL ANTHEM 205 

EPIGRAM 207 

SONNET 208 

"l DO NOT ask" 209 

ODE IN MAY 210 

SONG 214 

THE WORLD IN ARMOUR 216 

TO A FRIEND 219 

AN EPITAPH 220 

PEACE AND WAR 221 

TO . . 222 

SONG IN IMITATION OF THE ELIZABETHANS , , 223 

EPIGRAM . . 225 

THE FRONTIER 226 

THE LURE . 227 

xii 



CONTENTS 

Faob 

EPIGRAM 228 

THE PROTEST 229 

"since life is rough" 231 

THE TOMB OP BURNS 232 

EPIGRAM . f . 242 

SONNETS, ETC., FROM "THE TEAR OP SHAME " — 

TO A LADY 245 

THE TIRED LION 246 

THE KNELL OF CHIVALRY 247 

A TRIAL OP ORTHODOXY 248 

TO THE SULTAN 249 

ON THE REPORTED EXPULSION FROM FRANCE OF 
AHMED RIZA, A DISAFFECTED SUBJECT OP 

THE SULTAN . . . . . . . . 250 

ON A CERTAIN EUROPEAN ALLIANCE . . . 251 

TO OUR SOVEREIGN LADY 252 

EUROPE AT THE PLAY 253 

ESTRANGEMENT 255 

EPIGRAM 256 

THE LOST EDEN 257 

EPIGRAM 259 

INVENTION 260 

EPIGRAM 261 

AN INSCRIPTION AT WINDERMERE .... 262 

SONG 264 

EPIGRAM 265 

ELUSION 266 

EPIGRAM . • 267 

xiii 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

TOO LATE 268 

THEY AND WE 270 

EPIGRAM 271 

THE HEIGHTS AND THE DEEPS 272 

THE captive's DKEAM 274 

TO MRS. HERBERT STUDD 275 

THE UNKNOWN GOD 277 

TO THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH 282 

THE HOPE OP THE WORLD 283 

AFTER DEFEAT 292 

TO THE LADY KATHARINE MANNERS .... 294 

JUBILEE NIGHT IN WESTMORLAND .... 296 

BACH, IN THE FUGUES AND PRELUDES . . . 299 

APOLOGIA 300 



SIT 



WORDSWORTH'S GRAVE 



l\ 



iJ ^ h — . 

T^HE old rude churchy /\vith bare, bald tower; is here; 

Beneath its shadow high-born Rotha flows ; 
Rotha, remembering well who slumbers near, 

And with cool murmur lulling his repose. 

J <" u» — ][ ^ ' " -K - ' "^ — " 

Rotha, reraembenng well who slumbers near. 

His hills, his lakes, his streams are with him yet. 

Surely the heart that read her own heart clear 

Nature forgets not soon : 'tis we forget. 

We that with vagrant soul his fixity 

Have slighted ; faithless, done his deep faith wrong 
Left him for poorer loves, and bowed the knee 

To misbegotten strange new gods of song. 



WORDSWORTH'S GRAVE 

Yet, led by hollow ghost or beckoning elf 
Far from her homestead to the desert bourn. 

The vagrant soul returning to herself 
Wearily wise, must needs to him return. 

To him and to the powers that with him dwell : — 
Inflowings that divulged not whence they came ; 

And that secluded spirit unknowable. 

The mystery we make darker with a name ; 

The Somewhat which we name but cannot know, 
Ev'n as we name a star and only see 

His quenchless flashings forth, which ever show 
And ever hide him, and which are not he. 



H 

Poet who sleepest by this wandering wave ! 

When thou wast born, what birth-gift hadst thou 

then ? 

To thee what wealth was that the Immortals gave. 

The wealth thou gavest in thy turn to men ? 

2 



WORDSWORTH'S GRAVE 

Not Milton's keen, translunar music thine ; 

Not Shakespeare's cloudless, boundless human 
view; 
Not Shelley's flush of rose on peaks divine ; 

Nor yet the wizard twilight Coleridge knew. 

What hadst thou that could make so large amends 
For all thou hadst not and thy peers possessed. 

Motion and fire, swift means to radiant ends ? — 
Thou hadst, for weary feet, the gift of rest. 

From Shelley's dazzling glow or thunderous haze, 
From Byron's tempest-anger, tempest-mirth. 

Men turned to thee and found — not blast and 
blaze. 
Tumult of tottering heavens, but peace on earth. 

Nor peace that grows by Lethe, scentless flower. 

There in white languors to decline and cease ; 

But peace whose names are also rapture, power. 

Clear sight, and love : for these are parts of peace. 

3 



WORDSWORTH'S GRAVE 



III 

I hear it vouched the Muse is with us still ; — 
If less divinely frenzied than of yore, 

In lieu of feelings she has wondrous skill 
To simulate emotion felt no more. 

Not such the authentic Presence pure, that made 
This valley vocal in the great days gone ! — 

In his great days, while yet the spring-time played 
About him, and the mighty morning shone. 

No word-mosaic artificer, he sang 
A lofty song of lowly weal and dole. 

Right from the heart, right to the heart it sprang. 
Or from the soul leapt instant to the soul. 

He felt the charm of childhood, grace of youth. 

Grandeur of age, insisting to be sung. 

The impassioned argument was simple truth 

Half-wondering at its own melodious tongue. 

4 



WORDSWORTH'S GRAVE 

Impassioned ? ay, to the song's ecstatic core ! 

But fai* removed were clangour, storm and feud ; 
For plenteous health was his, exceeding store 

Of joy, and an impassioned quietude. 



IV 

A hundred years ere he to manhood came. 

Song from celestial heights had wandered down. 

Put off her robe of sunlight, dew and flame, 

And donned a modish dress to charm the Town. 

Thenceforth she but festooned the porch of things ; 

Apt at life's lore, incurious what life meant. 
Dextrous of hand, she struck her lute's few strings ; 

Ignobly perfect, barrenly content. 

Unflushed with ardour and unblanched with awe. 

Her lips in profitless derision curled. 

She saw with dull emotion — if she saw — 

The vision of the glory of the world. 

5 



WORDSWORTH'S GRAVE 

The human masque she watched, with dreamless 
eyes 
In whose clear shallows lurked no trembling 
shade. : 
The stars, unkenned by her, might set and rise. 
Unmarked by her, the daisies bloom and fade. 

The age grew sated with her sterile wit. 

Herself waxed weary on her loveless throne. 
Men felt life's tide, the sweep and surge of it, 

And craved a living voice, a natural tone. 

For none the less, though song was but half true. 
The world lay common, one abounding theme. 

Man joyed and wept, and fate was ever new, 
And love was sweet, life real, death no dream. 

In sad stern verse the rugged scholar-sage 

Bemoaned his toil unvalued, youth uncheered. 

His numbers wore the vesture of the age. 

But, 'neath it beating, the great heart was heard. 

6 



WORDSWORTH'S GRAVE 

From dewy pastures^ uplands sweet with thyme, 
A virgin breeze freshened the jaded day. 

It wafted Collins' lonely vesper-chime, 

It breathed abroad the frugal note of Gray. 

It fluttered here and there, nor swept in vain 
The dusty haunts where futile echoes dwell, — 

Then, in a cadence soft as summer rain. 

And sad from Auburn voiceless, drooped and fell. 

It drooped and fell, and one 'neath northern skies. 
With southern heart, who tilled his father's field. 

Found Poesy a-dying, bade her rise 

And touch quick Nature's hem and go forth 
healed. 

On life's broad plain the ploughman's conquering 
share 
Upturned the fallow lands of truth anew. 
And o'er the formal garden's trim parterre 

The peasant's team a ruthless furrow drew. 

7 



WORDSWORTH'S GRAVE 

Bright was his going forth^ but clouds ere long 
Whelmed him ; in gloom his radiance set, and 
those 

Twin morning stars of the new century's song, 
Those morning stars that sang together, rose. 

In elvish speech the Dreamer told his tale 

Of marvellous oceans swept by fateful wings. — 

The Seer strayed not from earth's human pale. 
But the mysterious face of common things 

He mirrored as the moon in Rydal Mere 

Is mirrored, when the breathless night hangs blue : 

Strangely remote she seems and wondrous near. 
And by some nameless difference born anew. 



V 

Peace — peace — and rest ! Ah, how the lyre is loth. 

Or powerless now, to give what all men seek ! 

Either it deadens with ignoble sloth 

Or deafens with shrill tumult, loudly weak. 

8 



WORDSWORTH'S GRAVE 

Where is the singer wliose large notes and clear 
Can heal and arm and plenish and sustain ? 

Lo^ one with empty music floods the ear, 

And one, the heart refreshing, tires the brain. 

And idly tuneful, the loquacious throng- 
Flutter and twitter, prodigal of time. 

And little masters make a toy of song 

Till grave men weary of the sound of rhyme. 

And some go prankt in faded antique dress. 
Abhorring to be hale and glad and free ; 

And some parade a conscious naturalness, 
The scholar's not the child's simplicity. 

Enough ; — and wisest who from words forbear. 

The kindly river rails not as it glides ; 
And suave and charitable, the winning air 

Chides not at all, or only him who chides. 



9 



WORDSWORTH'S GRAVE 

VI 

Nature ! we storm thine ear with choric notes. 

Thou answerest through the calm great nights 
and days, 
" Laud me who will : not tuneless are your throats ; 

Yet if ye paused I should not miss the praise." 

We falter, half-rebuked, and sing again. 

We chant thy desertness and haggard gloom, 
Or with thy splendid wrath inflate the strain. 

Or touch it with thy colour and perfume. 

One, his melodious blood aflame for thee. 

Wooed with fierce lust, his hot heart world-defiled. 

One, with the upward eye of infancy. 

Looked in thy face, and felt himself thy child. 

Thee he approached without distrust or dread — 

Beheld thee throned, an awful queen, above — 

Climbed to thy lap and merely laid his head 

Against thy warm wild heart of mother-love. 

10 



WORDSWORTH'S GRAVE 

He heard that vast heart beating — thou didst press 
Thy child so close, and lov'dst him unaware. 

Thy beauty gladdened him ; yet he scarce less 
Had loved thee, had he never found thee fair ! 

For thou wast not as legendary lands 

To which with curious eyes and ears we roam. 

Nor wast thou as a fane 'mid solemn sands. 

Where palmers halt at evening. Thou wast 
home. 

And here, at home, still bides he ; but he sleeps ; 

Not to be wakened even at thy word ; 
Though we, vague dreamers, dream he somewhere 
keeps 

An ear still open to thy voice still heard, — 

Thy voice, as heretofore, about him blown. 
For ever blown about his silence now ; 

Thy voice, though deeper, yet so like his own 

That almost, when he sang, we deemed 'twas 

thou ! 

11 



WORDSWORTH'S GRAVE 

VII 

Behind Helm Crag and Silver Howe the sheen 
Of the retreating day is less and less. 

Soon will the lordlier summits^ here unseen,, 
Gather the night about their nakedness. 

The half-heard bleat of sheep comes from the hill. 

Faint sounds of childish play are in the air. 
The river murmurs past. All else is still. 

The very graves seem stiller than they were. 

Afar though nation be on nation hurled, 

And life with toil and ancient pain depressed. 

Here one may scarce believe tlie whole wide world 
Is not at peace, and all man's heart at rest. 

Rest ! 'twas the gift he gave ; and peace ! the shade 
He spread, for spirits fevered with the sun. 

To him his bounties are come back — here laid 
In rest, in peace, his labour nobly done. 

1884-87. 

12 



SHELLEY'S CENTENARY 



SHELLEY'S CENTENARY 

(4th August 1892) 

VVTITHIN a narrow span of time, 
Three princes of the realm of rhyme, 
At height of youth or manhood's prime 

From earth took wing. 
To join the fellowship sublime 

Who, dead, yet sing. 

He, first, his earliest wreath who wove 

Of laurel grown in Latmian grove, 

Conquered by pain and hapless love 

Found calmer home. 

Roofed by the heaven that glows above 

Eternal Rome. 
13 



SHELLEY'S CENTENARY 

A fierier soul, its own fierce prey, 
And cumbered with more mortal clay, 
At Missolonghi flamed away, 

And left the air 
Reverberating to this day 

Its loud despair. 



Alike remote from Byron's scorn 
And Keats's magic as of morn 
Bursting for ever newly-born 

On forests old. 
To wake a hoary world forlorn 

With touch of gold, 



Shelley, the cloud-begot, who grew 

Nourished on air and sun and dew, 

Into that Essence whence he drew 

His life and lyre 

Was fittingly resolved anew 

Through wave and fire. 
14 



SHELLEY'S CENTENARY 

'Twas like his rapid soul ! 'Twas meet 
That he, who brooked not Time's slow feet. 
With passage thus abrupt and fleet 

Should hurry hence, 
Eager the Great Perhaps to greet 

With Why ? and Whence ? 



Impatient of the world's fixed way, 
He ne'er could suffer God's delay. 
But all the future in a day 

Would build divine. 
And the whole past in ruins lay, 

An emptied shrine. 



Vain vision ! but the glow, the fire, 

The passion of benign desire. 

The glorious yearning, lift him higher 

Than many a soul 

That mounts a million paces nigher 

Its meaner goal. 
15 



SHELLEY'S CENTENARY 

And power is his, if naught besides, 
In that thin ether where he rides^ 
Above the roar of human tides 

To ascend afar, 
Lost in a storm of light that hides 

His dizzy car. 



Below, the unhasting world toils on. 
And here and there are victories won, 
Some dragon slain, some justice done, 

While, through the skies, 
A meteor rushing on the sun. 

He flares and dies. 



But, as he cleaves yon ether clear. 

Notes from the unattempted Sphere 

He scatters to the enchanted ear 

Of earth's dim throng. 

Whose dissonance doth more endear 

The showering song. 
16 



SHELLEY'S CENTENARY 

In other shapes than he forecast 

The world is moulded : his fierce blast,- 

His wild assault upon the Past, — 

These things are vain ; 
Revolt is transient : what must last 

Is that pure strain. 



Which seems the wandering voices blent 

Of every virgin element, — 

A sound from ocean caverns sent, — 

An airy call 
From the pavilioned firmament 

O'erdoming all. 



And in this world of worldlings, where 

Souls rust in apathy, and ne'er 

A great emotion shakes the air. 

And life flags tame. 

And rare is noble impulse, rare 

The impassioned aim, 

17 B 



SHELLEY'S CENTENARY 

'Tis no mean fortune to have heard 
A singer who, if errors blurred 
His sight, had yet a spirit stirred 

By vast desire. 
And ardour fledging the swift word 

With plumes of fire. 



A creature of impetuous breath. 
Our torpor deadlier than death 
He knew not ; whatsoe'er he saith 

Flashes with life : 
He spurreth men, he quickeneth 

To splendid strife. 



And in his gusts of song he brings 

Wild odours shaken from strange wings. 

And unfamiliar whisperings 

From far lips blown. 

While all the rapturous heart of things 

Throbs through his own, — 
18 



SHELLEY'S CENTENARY 

His own that from the burning pyre 
One who had loved his wind-swept lyre 
Out of the sharp teeth of the fire 

Unmolten drew, 
Beside the sea that in her ire 

Smote him and slew. 



19 



LACHRYMiE MUSARUM 



LACHRYM^ MUSARUM 

(6th October 1892) 

T OWj like another's, lies the laurelled head : 
The life that seemed a perfect song is o'er : 
Carry the last great bard to his last bed. 
Land that he loved, thy noblest voice is mute. 
Land that he loved, that loved him ! nevermore 
Meadow of thine, smooth lawn or wild sea-shore, 
Gardens of odorous bloom and tremulous fruit. 
Or woodlands old, like Druid couches spread. 
The master's feet shall tread. 
Death's little rift hath rent the faultless lute : 
The singer of undying songs is dead. 

Lo, in this season pensive-hued and grave, 

While fades and falls the doomed, reluctant leaf 

20 



LACHRYMtE musarum 

From withered Earth's fantastic coronal. 

With wandering sighs of forest and of wave 

Mingles the murmur of a people's grief 

For him whose leaf shall fade not, neither fall. 

He hath fared forth, beyond these suns and 

showers. 
For us, the autumn glow, the autumn flame. 
And soon the winter silence shall be ours : 
Him the eternal spring of fadeless fame 
Crowns with no mortal flowers. 

What needs his laurel our ephemeral tears. 

To save from visitation of decay ? 

Not in this temporal light alone, that bay 

Blooms, nor to perishable mundane ears 

Sings he with lips of transitory clay. 

Rapt though he be from us, 

Virgil salutes him, and Theocritus ; 

Catullus, mightiest-brained Lucretius, each 

Greets him, their brother, on the Stygian beach ; 

Proudly a gaunt right hand doth Dante reach ; 

Milton and Wordsworth bid him welcome home ; 

21 



LACHRYMiE MUSARUM 

Keats, on his lips the eternal rose of youth, 

Doth in the name of Beauty that is Truth 

A kinsman's love beseech ; 

Coleridge, his locks aspersed with fairy foam, 

Calm Spenser, Chaucer suave. 

His equal friendship crave : 

And godlike spirits hail him guest, in speech 

Of Athens, Florence, Weimar, Stratford, Rome. 



He hath returned to regions whence he came. 
Him doth the spirit divine 
Of universal loveliness reclaim. 
All nature is his shrine. 

Seek him henceforward in the wind and sea. 
In earth's and air's emotion or repose. 
In every star's august serenity. 
And in the rapture of the flaming rose. 
There seek him if ye would not seek in vain. 
There, in the rhythm and music of the Whole ; 
Yea, and for ever in the human soul 

Made stronger and more beauteous by his strain. 

22 



LACHRYM^ MUSARUM 

For lo ! creation's self is one great choir. 

And what is nature's order but the rhyme 

Whereto in holiest unanimity 

All things with all things move unfalteringly, 

Infolded and communal from their prime ? 

Who shall expound the mystery of the lyre ? 

In far retreats of elemental mind 

Obscurely comes and goes 

The imperative breath of song, that as the 
wind 

Is trackless, and oblivious whence it blows. 

Demand of lilies wherefore they are white, 

Extort her crimson secret from the rose, 

But ask not of the Muse that she disclose 

The meaning of the riddle of her might : 

Somewhat of all things sealed and recondite, 

Save the enigma of herself, she knows. 

The master could not tell, with all his lore, 

Wherefore he sang, or whence the mandate 

sped : 

Ev'n as the linnet sings, so I, he said ; — 

Ah, rather as the imperial nightingale, 

23 



LACHRYM^ MUSARUM 

That held in trance the ancient Attic shore, 
And charms the ages with the notes that o'er 
All woodland chants immortally prevail ! 
And now, from our vain plaudits greatly fled, 
He with diviner silence dwells instead, 
And on no earthly sea with transient roar. 
Unto no earthly airs, he trims his sail, 
But far bej'^ond our vision and our hail 
Is heard for ever and is seen no more. 

No more, O never now. 
Lord of the lofty and the tranquil brow- 
Whereon nor snows of time 
Have fall'n, nor Avintry rime. 
Shall men behold thee, sage and mage sublime. 
Once, in his youth obscure. 
The maker of this verse, which shall endure 
By splendour of its theme that cannot die. 
Beheld thee eye to eye. 
And touched through thee the hand 
Of every hero of thy race divine, 

Ev'n to the sire of all the laurelled line, 
24 



LACHRYM^ MUSARUM 

The sightless wanderer on the Ionian strand, 
With soul as healthful as the poignant brine, 
Wide as his skies and radiant as his seas, 
Starry from haunts of his Familiars nine. 
Glorious Maeonides. 

Yea, I beheld thee, and behold thee yet : 
Thou hast forgotten, but can I forget ? 
The accents of thy pure and sovereign tongue. 
Are they not ever goldenly impressed 
On memory's palimpsest ? 
I see the wizard locks like night that hung, 
I tread the floor thy hallowing feet have trod ; 
I see the hands a nation's lyre that strung, 
The eyes that looked through life and gazed on 
God. 

The seasons change, the winds they shift and 

veer ; 

The grass of yesteryear 

Is dead ; the birds depart, the groves decay : 

Empires dissolve and peoples disappear : 

Song passes not away. 
25 



LACHRYM^ MUSARUM 

Captains and conquerors leave a little dust. 
And kings a dubious legend of their reign ; 
The swords of Caesars, they are less than rust : 
The poet doth remain. 
Dead is Augustus, Maro is alive ; 
And thou, the Mantuan of our age and clime. 
Like Virgil shalt thy race and tongue survive. 
Bequeathing no less honeyed words to time, 
Embalmed in amber of eternal rhyme. 
And rich with sweets from every Muse's hive ; 
While to the measure of the cosmic rune 
For purer ears thou shalt thy lyre attune. 
And heed no more the hum of idle praise 
In that great calm our tumults cannot reach, 
Master who crown'st our immelodious days 
With flower of perfect speech. 



26 



TO EDWARD DOWDEN 



TO EDWARD DOWDEN 

On receiving from him a Copy of "The Life 
OF Shelley " 

THIRST, ere I slake my hunger, let me thank 
The giver of the feast. For feast it is. 
Though of ethereal, translunary fare — 
His story who pre-eminently of men 
Seemed nourished upon starbeams and the stuff 
Of rainbows, and the tempest, and the foam ; 
Who hardly brooked on his impatient soul 
The fleshly trammels ; whom at last the sea 
Gave to the fire, from whose wild arms the winds 
Took him, and shook him broadcast to the world. 

In my young days of fervid poesy 
He drew me to him with his strange far light, — 

He held me in a world all clouds and gleams, 

27 



TO EDWARD DOWDEN 

And vasty phantoms^ where ev'n Man himself 

Moved like a phantom 'mid the clouds and gleams. 

Anon the Earth recalled me. and a voice 

Murmuring of dethroned divinities 

And dead times deathless upon sculptured urn — 

And Philomela's long-descended pain 

Flooding tlie niglit — and maidens of romance 

To whom asleep St. Agnes' love-dreams come — 

Awhile constrained me to a sweet duresse 

And thraldom^ lapping me in high content, 

Soft as the bondage of white amorous arms. 

And then a third voice, long unheeded — held 

Claustral and cold, and dissonant and tame — 

Found me at last with ears to hear. It sang 

Of lowly sorrows and fjimihar joys, 

Of simple manhood, artless womanhood. 

And childhood fragrant as the limpid morn : 

And from the homely matter nigh at hand 

Ascending and dilating, it disclosed 

Spaces and avenues, calm heights and breadths 

Of vision, whence I saw each blade of grass 

With roots that groped about eternity, 

28 



TO EDWARD DOWDEN 

And in each drop of dew upon each blade 

The mirror of the inseparable All. 

The first voice, then the second, in their turns 

Had sung me captive. This voice sang me free. 

Therefore, above all vocal sons of men, 

Since him whose sightless eyes saw hell and heaven, 

To Wordsworth be my homage, thanks, and love. 

Yet dear is Keats, a lucid presence, great 

With somewhat of a glorious soullessness. 

And dear, and great with an excess of soul, 

Shelley, the hectic flamelike rose of verse. 

All colour, and all odour, and all bloom. 

Steeped in the noonlight, glutted with the sun. 

But somewhat lacking root in homely earth. 

Lacking such human moisture as bedews 

His not less starward stem of song, who, rapt 

Not less in glowing vision, yet retained 

His clasp of the prehensible, retained 

The warm touch of the world that lies to hand, 

Not in vague dreams of man forgetting men, 

Nor in vast morrows losing the to-day ; 

Who trusted nature, trusted fate, nor found 

29 



TO EDWARD DOWDEN 

An Ogre_, sovereign on the throne of things ; 

Who felt the incumbence of the unknown, yet bore 

Without resentment the Divine reserve ; 

Who suffered not his spirit to dash itself 

Against the crags and wavelike break in spray, 

But 'midst the infinite tranquillities 

Moved tranquil, and henceforth, by Rotha stream 

And Rydal's mountain-mirror, and where flows 

Yarrow thrice sung or Duddon to the sea. 

And wheresoever man's heart is thrilled by tones 

Struck from man's lyric heartstrings, shall survive. 



30 



EPIGRAM 



'npiS human fortune's happiest height,, to be 
A spirit melodious, lucid, poised, and whole 

Second in order of felicity 

I hold it, to have walk'd with such a soul. 



Si 



AUTUMN 



AUTUMN 

'^PHOU burden of all songs the earth hath sung, 
Thou retrospect m Time's reverted eyes, 
Thou metaphor of everything that dies, 

That dies ill-starred, or dies beloved and young 
And therefore blest and wise, — 

O be less beautiful, or be less brief. 

Thou tragic splendour, strange, and full of fear ! 
In vain her pageant shall the Summer rear ? 

At thy mute signal, leaf by golden leaf. 
Crumbles the gorgeous year. 

Ah, ghostly as remembered mirth, the tale 

Of Summer's bloom, the legend of the Spring ! 
And thou, too, flutterest an impatient wing. 

Thou presence yet more fugitive and frail. 

Thou most unbodied thing, 
32 



AUTUMN 

Whose very being is thy going hence^ 

And passage and departure all thy theme ; 
Whose life doth still a splendid dying seem, 

And thou at height of thy magnificence 
A figment and a dream. 

Stilled is the virgin rapture that was June, 

And cold is August's panting heart of fire ; 

And in the storm-dismantled forest-choir 
For thine own elegy thy winds attune 

Their wild and wizard lyre : 
And poignant grows the charm of thy decay, 

The pathos of thy beauty, and the sting, 

Thou parable of greatness vanishing ! 
For me, thy woods of gold and skies of grey 
With speech fantastic ring. 

For me, to dreams resigned, there come and go, 

'Twixt mountains draped and hooded night and 

morn, 

Elusive notes in wandering wafture borne, 

33 c 



AUTUMN 

From undiscoverable lips that blow 

An immaterial horn ; 
And spectral seem thy winter-boding trees. 
Thy ruinous bowers and drifted foliage wet — 
O Past and Future in sad bridal met, 
O voice of everything that perishes,, 
And soul of all regret ! 



34 



WORLD-STRANGENESS 



WORLD-STRANGENESS 



QTRANGE the world about me lies, 
Never yet familiar grown — 

Still disturbs me with surprise. 

Haunts me like a face half known. 



In this house with starry dome. 

Floored with gemlike plains and seas, 

Shall I never feel at home. 
Never wholly be at ease ? 

On from room to room I stray. 

Yet my Host can ne'er espy, 

And I know not to this day 

Whether guest or captive I. 
35 



WORLD-STRANGENESS 

So, between the starry dome 

And the floor of plains and seas, 

I have never felt at home. 
Never wholly been at ease. 



36 



EPIGRAM 



T^HE statue — Buonarotti said — doth wait, 
Thraird in the block, for me to emancipate. 
The poem — saith the poet — wanders free 
Till I betray it to captivity. 



37 



THE MOCK SELF 



THE MOCK SELF 

"p^EW friends are mine, though many wights there 

be 
Who, meeting oft a phantasm that makes claim 
To be myself, and hath my face and name, 
And whose thin fraud I wink at privily. 
Account this light impostor very me. 
What boots it undeceive them, and proclaim 
Myself myself, and whelm this cheat with shame ? 
I care not, so he leave my true self free, 
Impose not on me also ; but alas I 
I too, at fault, bewildered, sometimes take 
Him for myself, and far from mine own sight. 
Torpid, indifferent, doth mine own self pass ; 
And yet anon leaps suddenly awake. 
And spurns the gibbering mime into the night. 



38 



ENGLAND AND HER COLONIES 



ENGLAND AND HER COLONIES 

OHE stands^ a thousand-wintered tree, 

By countless morns impearled ; 
Her broad roots coil beneath the sea, - 

Her branches sweep the world ; 
Her seeds, by careless winds conveyed. 

Clothe the remotest strand 
With forests from her scatterings made. 
New nations fostered in her shade, 

And linking land with land. 



O ye by wandering tempest sown 

'Neath every alien star. 

Forget not whence the breath was blown 

That wafted you afar ! 
39 



ENGLAND AND HER COLONIES 

For ye are still her ancient seed 

On younger soil let fall — 
Children of Britain's island-breed. 
To whom the Mother in her need 
Perchance may one day call. 



40 



TO A POET 



TO A POET 

nniME, the extortioner, from richest beauty 
Takes heavy toll and wrings rapacious duty. 
Austere of feature if thou carve thy rhyme, 
Perchance 'twill pay the lesser tax to Time. 



41 



^^WHEN BIRDS WERE SONGLESS" 



VVTHEN birds were songless on the bough 

I heard thee sing. 
The world was full of winter^ thou 

Wert full of spring. 

To-day the world's heart feels anew 

The vernal thrill. 
And thine beneath the rueful yew 

Is wintry chill. 



42 



FELICITY 



FELICITY 

A SQUALID, hideous town, where streams run 

black 

With vomit of a hundred roaring mills, — 

Hither occasion calls me ; and ev*n here, 

All in the sable reek that wantonly 

Defames the sunlight and deflowers the morn, 

One may at least surmise the sky still blue. 

Ev'n here, the myriad slaves of the machine 

Deem life a boon ; and here, in days far sped, 

I overheard a kind-eyed girl relate 

To her companions, how a favouring chance 

By some few shillings weekly had increased 

The earnings of her household, and she said : 

'' So now we are happy, having all we wished," — 

Felicity indeed ! though more it lay 

In wanting little than in winning all. 

43 



FELICITY 

Felicity indeed ! Across the years 
To me her tones come back, rebuking ; me. 
Spreader of toils to snare the wandering Joy 
No guile may capture and no force surprise — 
Only by them that never wooed her, won. 

O curst witli wide desires and spacious dreams. 
Too cunningly do ye accumulate 
Appliances and means of happiness, 
E'er to be happy ! Lavish hosts, ye make 
Elaborate preparation to receive 
A shy and simple guest, who, warned of all 
The ceremony and circumstance wherewith 
Ye mean to entertain her, will not come. 



44 



IN LALEHAM CHURCHYARD 



IN LALEHAM CHURCHYARD* 

(18th August 1890) 

'HP WAS at this season^ year by year, 
The singer who Hes songless here 
Was wont to woo a less austere. 

Less deep repose. 
Where Rotha to Winandermere 

Unresting flows, — 

Flows through a land where torrents call 
To far-off torrents as they fall. 
And mountains in their cloudy pall 

Keep ghostly state^ 
And Nature makes majestical 

Man's lowliest fate. 



The burial-place of Matthew Arnold. 
45 



IN LALEHAM CHURCHYARD 

There_, 'mid the August glow, still came 
He of the twice-illustrious name_, 
The loud impertinence of fame 

Not loth to flee — 
Not loth with brooks and fells to claim 

Fraternity. 



Linked with his happy youthful lot, 
Is Loughrigg, then, at last forgot ? 
Nor silent peak nor dalesman's cot 

Looks on his grave. 
Lulled by the Thames he sleeps, and not 

By Rotha's wave. 



'Tis fittest thus ! for though with skill 

He sang of beck and tarn and ghyll. 

The deep, authentic mountain-thrill 

Ne'er shook his page ! 

Somewhat of worldling mingled still 

With bard and sage. 
46 



IN LALEHAM CHURCHYARD 

And 'twere less meet for him to lie 
Guarded by summits lone and high 
That traffic with the eternal sky 

And hear, unawed. 
The everlasting fingers ply 

The loom of God, 



Than, in this hamlet of the plain, 
A less sublime repose to gain, 
Where Nature, genial and urbane, 

To man defers, 
Yielding to us the right to reign, 

Which yet is hers. 



And nigh to where his bones abide. 
The Thames with its unruffled tide 
Seems like his genius typified, — 

Its strength, its grace. 
Its lucid gleam, its sober pride, 

Its tranquil pace. 

47 



IN LALEHAM CHURCHYARD 

But ah ! not his the eventual fate 
Which doth the journeying wave await — 
Doomed to resign its hmpid state 

And quickly grow 
Turbid as passion_, dark as hate. 

And wide as woe. 



Rather, it may be, over-much 

He shunned the common stain and smutch, 

From soilure of ignoble touch 

Too grandly free. 
Too loftily secure in such' 

Cold purity. 



But he preserved from chance control 

The fortress of his 'stablisht soul ; 

In all things sought to see the Whole ; 

Brooked no disguise ; 
And set his heart upon the goal, 

Not on the prize. 

48 



IN LALEHAM CHURCHYARD 

With those Elect he shall survive 
Who seem not to compete or strive. 
Yet with the foremost still arrive. 

Prevailing still : 
Spirits with whom the stars connive 

To work their will. 

And ye, the baffled many, who, 
Dejected, from afar off view 
The easily victorious few 

Of calm renown, — 
Have ye not your sad glory too. 

And mournful crown ? 

Great is the facile conqueror; 
Yet haply he, who, wounded sore. 
Breathless, unhorsed, all covered o'er 

With blood and sweat, 
Sinks foiled, but fighting evermore, 

Is greater yet. 



49 



LIFE WITHOUT HEALTH 



LIFE WITHOUT HEALTH 

"OEHOLD life builded as a goodly house 

And grown a mansion ruinous 

With winter blowing through its crumbling walls ! 

The master paceth up and down his halls, 

And in the empty hours 

Can hear the tottering of his towers 

And tremor of their bases underground. 

And oft he starts and looks around 

At creaking of a distant door 

Or echo of his footfall on the floor. 

Thinking it may be one whom he awaits 

And hath for many days awaited, 

Coming to lead him through the mouldering 

gates 
Out somewhere, from his home dilapidated. 



50 



THE FLIGHT OF YOUTH 



THE FLIGHT OF YOUTH 

TT'OUTH ! ere thou be flown away, 
Surely one last boon to-day 

Thou'lt bestow — 
One last light of rapture give. 
Rich and lordly fugitive ! 

Ere thou go. 



What, thou canst not ? What, all spent ? 
All thy spells of ravishment 

Pow'rless now ? 
Gone thy magic out of date ? 
Gone, all gone that made thee great ? — 

Follow thou ! 



51 



EPIGRAM 



nPHE Poet gathers fruit from every tree, 
Yea, grapes from thorns and figs from thistles he. 
Pluck'd by his hand, the basest weed that grows 
Towers to a lily, reddens to a rose. 



52 



"UNDER THE DARK AND PINY STEEP" 



TTNDER the dark and piny steep 
We watched the storm crash by : 

We saw the bright brand leap and leap 
Out of the shattered sky. 

The elements were minist'ring 

To make one mortal blest ; 
For, peal by peal, you did but cling 

The closer to his breast. 



5S 



"NAY, BID ME NOT" 



I^AY, bid me not my cares to leave, 
Who cannot from their shadow flee. 

I do but win a short reprieve, 
'Scaping to pleasure and to thee. 

I may, at best, a moment's grace. 
And grant of liberty, obtain ; 

Respited for a little space, 
To go back into bonds again. 



54 



A PRELUDE 



A PRELUDE 

nPHE mighty poets from their flowing store 
Dispense like casual alms the careless ore ; 
Through throngs of men their lonely way they go, 
Let fall their costly thoughts, nor seem to know. — 
Not mine the rich and showering hand, that strews 
The facile largess of a stintless Muse. 
A fitful presence, seldom tarrying long. 
Capriciously she touches me to song — 
Then leaves me to lament her flight in vain. 
And wonder will she ever come again. 



55 



ON LANDOR'S "HELLENICS" 



ON LANDOR'S "HELLENICS" 

/^OME hither, who grow cloyed to surfeiting 
With lyric draughts o'ersweet, from rills that rise 
On Hybla not Parnassus mountain : come 
With beakers rinsed of the dulcifluous wave 
Hither, and see a magic miracle 
Of happiest science, the bland Attic skies 
True-mirrored by an English well ; — no stream 
Whose heaven-belying surface makes the stars 
Reel, with its restless idiosyncrasy ; 
But well unstirred, save when at times it takes 
Tribute of lovers' eyelids, and at times 
Bubbles with laughter of some sprite below. 



56 



ENGLAND MY MOTHER 



ENGLAND MY MOTHER 



"PNGLAND my mother. 
Wardress of waters, 
Builder of peoples, 
Maker of men, — 

Hast thou yet leisure 
Left for the muses ? 
Heed'st thou the songsmith 
Forging the rhyme ? 

Deafened with tumults, 
How canst thou hearken ? 
Strident is faction. 

Demos is loud. 

57 



ENGLAND MY MOTHER 

Lazarus, hungry^ 
Menaces Dives ; 
Labour the giant 
Chafes in his hold. 

Yet do the songsraiths 
Quit not their forges ; 
Still on life's anvil 

Forge they the rhyme. 

Still the rapt faces 
Glow from the furnace : 
Breath of the smithy 
Scorches their brows. 

Yea, and thou hear'st them ? 
So shall the hammers 
Fashion not vainly 
Verses of gold. 



58 



ENGLAND MY MOTHER 



II 

Lo, with the ancient 
Roots of man's nature 
Twines the eternal 
Passion of song. 

Ever Love fans it, 
Ever Life feeds it ; 
Time cannot age it^ 
Death cannot slay. 

Deep in the world-heart 
Stand its foundations, 
Tangled with all things, 
Twin-made with all. 

Nay, what is Nature's 

Self, but an endless 

Strife toward music. 

Euphony, rhyme ? 
59 



ENGLAND MY MOTHER 

Trees in their blooming, 
Tides in their flowing. 
Stars in their circling. 
Tremble with song. 

God on His throne is 
Eldest of poets : 
Unto His measures 
Moveth the Whole. 



HI 

Therefore deride not 
Speech of the muses, 
England my mother. 
Maker of men. 

Nations are mortal. 

Fragile is greatness ; 

Fortune may fly thee, 

Song shall not fly. 
60 



ENGLAND MY MOTHER 

Song the all-girdling. 
Song cannot perish : 
Men shall make music, 
Man shall give ear. 

Not while the choric 
Chant of creation 
Floweth from all things. 
Poured without pause. 

Cease we to echo 
Faintly the descant 
Whereto for ever 
Dances the world. 



IV 

So let the songsmith 

Proffer his rhyme-gift, 

England my mother. 

Maker of men. 
61 



ENGLAND MY MOTHER 

Grey grows thy count' nance. 
Full of the ages ; 
Time on thy forehead 
Sits like a dream ; 



Song is the potion 
All things renewing, 
Youth's one elixir, 
Fountain of morn. 



Thou, at the world-loom 
Weaving thy future. 
Fitly may'st temper 
Toil with delight. 



Deemest thou, labour 

Only is earnest ? 

Grave is all beautv. 

Solemn is joy. 
62 



ENGLAND MY MOTHER 

Song is no bauble — 
Slight not the songsmith, 
England my mother, 
Maker of men. 



63 



"SCENTLESS FLOW'RS I BRING THEE" 



QCENTLESS flow'rs I bring thee— yet 
In thy bosom be they set ; 
In thy bosom each one grows 
Fragrant beyond any rose. 

Sweet enough were she who could, 
In thy heart's sweet neighbourhood, 
Some redundant sweetness thus 
Borrow from that overplus. 



64. 



SHELLEY AND HARRIET 



SHELLEY AND HARRIET 

A STAR look'd down from heaven and loved a 
flower 
Grown in earth's garden — loved it for an hour. 
Let eyes that trace his orbit in the spheres 
Refuse not, to a ruin'd rosebud, tears. 



65 



^^AND THESE— ARE THESE INDEED" 



AND these — are these indeed the end^ 
This grinning skull, this heavy loam ? 
Do all green ways whereby we wend 
Lead but to yon ignoble home ? 

Ah well ! thine eyes invite to bliss ; 

Thy lips are hives of summer still. 
I ask not other worlds while this 

Proffers me all the sweets I will. 



66 



THE RAVEN'S SHADOW 



THE RAVEN'S SHADOW 

QEABIRD, elemental sprite. 
Moulded of the sun and spray — 

Raven, dreary flake of night 
Drifting in the eye of day — 

What in common have ye two. 

Meeting 'twixt the blue and blue ? 



Thou to eastward carriest 

The keen savour of the foam, — 

Thou dost bear unto the west 

Fragrance from thy woody home. 

Where perchance a house is thine 

Odorous of the oozy pine. 
67 



THE RAVEN'S SHADOW 

Eastward thee thy proper cares, 
Things of mighty moment, call ; 

Thee to westward thine affairs 
Summon, weighty matters all : 

I, where land and sea contest. 

Watch you eastward, watch you west. 



Till, in snares of fancy caught, 
Mystically changed ye seem. 

And the bird becomes a thought. 
And the thought becomes a dream. 

And the dream, outspread on high. 

Lords it o'er the abject sky. 



Surely I have known before 

Phantoms of the shapes ye be — 

Haunters of another shore 
'Leaguered by another sea. 

There my wanderings night and morn 

Reconcile me to the bourn. 
68 



THE RAVEN'S SHADOW 

There the bird of happy wings 
Wafts the ocean-news I crave ; 

Rumours of an isle he brings 
Gemlike on the golden wave : 

But the baleful beak and plume 

Scatter im melodious gloom. 



Though the flow'rs be faultless made. 

Perfectly to live and die — 
Though the bright clouds bloom and fade 

Flow'rlike 'midst a meadowy sky — 
Where this raven roams forlorn 
Veins of midnight flaw the morn. 



He not less will croak and croak 
As he ever caws and caws, 

Till the starry dance be broke, 
Till the sphery paean pause, 

And the universal chime 

Falter out of tune and time. 
69 



THE RAVEN'S SHADOW 

Coils the labyrinthine sea 
Duteous to the lunar will, 

But some discord stealthily 
Vexes the world-ditty still, 

And the bird that caws and caws 

Clasps creation with his claws. 



ANTONY AT ACTIUM 



ANTONY AT ACTIUM 

TTE holds a dubious balance : — yet that scale. 
Whose freight the world is, surely shall prevail ? 
No ; Cleopatra droppeth into this 
One counterpoising orient sultry kiss. 



71 



THE GLIMPSE 



THE GLIMPSE 

TUST for a day you crossed my life's dull track, 

Put my ignobler dreams to sudden shame. 

Went your bright way, and left me to fall back 

On my own world of poorer deed and aim ; 

To fall back on my meaner world, and feel 

Like one who, dwelling 'mid some smoke- 
dimmed town, — 
In a brief pause of labour's sullen wheel, — 

'Scaped from the street's dead dust and factory's 
frown, — 

In stainless daylight saw the pure seas roll. 
Saw mountains pillaring the perfect sky : 

Then journeyed home, to carry in his soul 
The torment of the difference till he die. 



72 



TO A SEABIRD 



TO A SEABIRD 

"Tj^AIN would I have thee barter fates with me, — 
Lone loiterer where the shells like jewels be, 
Hung on the fringe and frayed hem of the sea. 
But no, — 'twere cruel, wild-wing'd Bliss ! to thee. 



73 



"WELL HE SLUMBERS, GREATLY SLAIN'' 



VVTELL he slumbers, greatly slain, 
Who in splendid battle dies ; 

Deep his sleep in midmost main 
Pillowed upon pearl who lies. 

Ease, of all good gifts the best. 
War and wave at last decree : 

Love alone denies us rest. 
Crueller than sword or sea. 



74 



LUX PERDITA 



LUX PERDITA 

nPHINE were the weak, slight hands 

That might have taken this strong soul^ and bent 

Its stubborn substance to thy soft intent. 

And bound it unresisting, with such bands 

As not the arm of envious heaven had rent. 

Thine were the calming eyes 
That round my pinnace could have stilled the sea, 
And drawn thy voyager home, and bid him be 
Pure with their pureness, with their wisdom wise. 
Merged in their light, and greatly lost in thee. 

But thou — thou passed'st on. 
With whiteness clothed of dedicated days. 
Cold, like a star ; and me in alien ways 
Thou leftest following life's chance lure, where shone 
The wandering gleam that beckons and betrays. 



75 



"THINGS THAT ARE MORE EXCELLENT" 



"THE THINGS THAT ARE MORE 
EXCELLENT " 

AS we wax older on this earth, 

Till many a toy that charmed us seems 
Emptied of beauty, stripped of worth, 

And mean as dust and dead as dreams, — 
For gauds that perished, shows that passed. 

Some recompense the Fates have sent : 
Thrice lovelier shine the things that last, 

The things that are more excellent. 



Tired of the Senate's barren brawl, 

An hour with silence we prefer. 

Where statelier rise the woods than all 

Yon towers of talk at Westminster. 
76 



^'THINGS THAT ARE MORE EXCELLENT" 

Let this man prate and that man plot, 

On fame or place or title bent : 
The votes of veering crowds are not 

The things that are more excellent. 

Shall we perturb and vex our soul 

For "wrongs " which no true freedom mar, 
Which no man's upright walk control, 

And from no guiltless deed debar ? 
What odds though tonguesters heal, or leave 

Unhealed, the grievance they invent ? 
To things, not phantoms, let us cleave — 

The things that are more excellent. 

r 

' Nought nobler is, than to be free : 
The stars of heaven are free because 

In amplitude of liberty 

Their joy is to obey the laws. 

From servitude to freedom's name 

Free thou thy mind in bondage pent ; 

Depose the fetich, and proclaim 

The things that are more excellent. / 

77 --- 



THINGS THAT ARE MORE EXCELLENT" 

And in appropriate dust be hurled 

That dull, punctilious god, whom they 
That call their tiny clan the world, 

Serve and obsequiously obey : 
Who con their ritual of Routine, 

With minds to one dead likeness blent. 
And never ev'n in dreams have seen 

The things that are more excellent. 

To dress, to call, to dine, to break 

No canon of the social code. 
The little laws that lacqueys make. 

The futile decalogue of Mode, — 
How many a soul for these things lives, 

With pious passion, grave intent ! 
While Nature careless-handed gives 

The things that are more excellent. 

To hug the wealth ye cannot use. 

And lack the riches all may gain, — 
O blind and wanting wit to choose. 

Who house the chaff and burn the grain I 

78 



"THINGS THAT ARE MORE EXCELLENT 

And still doth life with starry towers 
Lure to the bright, divine ascent ! — 

Be yours the things ye would : be ours 
The things that are more excellent. 

The grace of friendship — mind and heart 

Linked with their fellow heart and mind 
The gains of science, gifts of art ; 

The sense of oneness with our kind ; 
The thirst to know and understand — 

A large and liberal discontent : 
These are the goods in life's rich hand. 

The things that are more excellent. 

In faultless rhythm the ocean rolls, 
A rapturous silence thrills the skies ; 

And on this earth are lovely souls. 
That softly look with aidful eyes. 

Though dark, O God, Thy course and track, 
I think Thou must at least have meant 

That nought which lives should wholly lack 

The things that are more excellent. 

79 



EPIGRAM 



TN youth the artist voweth lover's vows 
To Art, in manhood maketh her his spouse. 
Well if her charms yet hold for him such joy 
As when he craved some boon and she was coy ! 



80 



THE GREAT MISGIVING 



THE GREAT MISGIVING 

"lyrOT ours/' say some, "the thought of death to 
dread ; 

Asking no heaven, we fear no fabled hell : 
Life is a feast, and we have banqueted — 

Shall not the worms as well ? 

" The after-silence, when the feast is o'er. 

And void the places where the minstrels stood. 

Differs in nought from what hath been before, 
And is nor ill nor good." 

Ah, but the Apparition — the dumb sign — 

The beckoning finger bidding me forego 

The fellowship, the converse, and the wine. 

The songs, the festal glow ! 

81 F 



THE GREAT MISGIVING 

And ah, to know not, while with friends I sit, 
And while the purple joy is passed about, 

Whether 'tis ampler day divinelier lit 
Or homeless night without ; 

And whether, stepping forth, my soul shall see 
New prospects, or fall sheer — a blinded thing ! 

There is, O grave, thy hourly victory. 
And there, O death, thy sting. 



82 



TO LORD TENNYSON 



TO LORD TENNYSON 

(With a Volume of Verse) 

]\/r ASTER and mage, our prince of song, whom Time 
In this your autumn mellow and serene, 
Crowns ever with fresh laurels, not less green 
Than garlands dewy from your verdurous prime ; 
Heir of the riches of the whole world's rhyme, 
Dow'r'd with the Attic grace, the Mantuan mien. 
With Arno's depth and Avon's golden sheen ; 
Singer to whom the singing ages climb, 
Convergent ; — if the youngest of the choir 
May snatch a flying splendour from your name, 
Making his page illustrious, and aspire 
For one rich moment your regard to claim, 
Suffer him at your feet to lay his lyre 
And touch the skirts and fringes of your fame. 



83 



THE KEY-BOARD 



THE KEY-BOARD 

"PIVE-AND-THIRTY black slaves, 

Half-a-hundred white, 
All their duty but to sing 

For their Queen's delight, 
Now with throats of thunder. 

Now with dulcet lips. 
While she rules them royally 

With her finger-tips ! 



When she quits her palace. 
All the slaves are dumb- 
Dumb with dolour till the Queen 

Back to Court is come : 
84 



THE KEY-BOARD 

Dumb the throats of thunder, 

Dumb the dulcet lips. 
Lacking all the sovereignty 

Of her finger-tips. 

Dusky slaves and pallid. 

Ebon slaves and white. 
When the Queen was on her throne 

How you sang to-night ! 
Ah, the throats of thunder ! 

Ah, the dulcet lips ! 
Ah, the gracious tyrannies 

Of her finger-tips ! 

Silent, silent, silent. 

All your voices now ; 
Was it then her life alone 

Did your life endow ? 
Waken, throats of thunder ! 

Waken, dulcet lips ! 

Touched to immortality 

By her finger-tips, 
85 



''TAMBURLAINE THE GREAT" 



AFTER READING "TAMBURLAINE 
THE GREAT" 

'V'OUR Marlowe's page I close^ my Shakespeare's 
ope. 

How welcome — after gong and cymbal's din — 
The continuity, the long slow slope 

And vast curves of the gradual violin ! 



86 



TO A FRIEND 



TO A FRIEND 

Chafing at enforced Idleness from 

INTERRUPTED HeALTH 



QOON may the edict lapse, that on you lays 
This dire compulsion of infertile days, 
This hardest penal toil, reluctant rest ! 
Meanwhile I count you eminently blest^ 
Happy from labours heretofore well done, 
Happy in tasks auspiciously begun. 
For they are blest that have not much to rue — 
That have not oft mis-heard the prompter's cue, 
Stammered and stumbled and the wrong parts 

played 
And life a Tragedy of Errors made. 



87 



EPIGRAM 



T^O keep in sight Perfection, and adore 
The vision, is the artist's best delight ; 

His bitterest pang, that he can ne'er do more 
Than keep her long'd-for loveliness in sight. 



88 



SONNETS 



FROM 



"VER TENEBROSUM 



59 



The eight sonnets here folloiv'ing are from a series of 
fifteen^ arising out of events of March and Aprils 
1885? and originally published in June of that 
year. 



SONNETS FROM ^'VER TENEBROSUM 



THE SOUDANESE 

'T'HEY wrong'd not us, nor sought 'gainst us to 

wage 

The bitter battle. On their God they cried 

For succour, deeming justice to abide 

In heaven, if banish'd from earth's vicinage. 

And when they rose with a gall'd lion's rage, 

We, on the captor's, keeper's, tamer's side. 

We, with the alien tyranny allied. 

We bade them back to their Egyptian cage. 

Scarce knew they who we were ! A wind of blight 

From the mysterious far north-west we came. 

Our greatness now their veriest babes have learn'd. 

Where, in wild desert homes, by day, by night. 

Thousands that weep their warriors unreturn'd, 

O England, O my country, curse thy name ! 

91 



SONNETS FROM "VER TENEBROSUM" 



THE ENGLISH DEAD 

/^IVE honour to our heroes faH'n, how ill 
Soe'er the cause that bade them forth to die. 
Honour to him, the untimely struck, whom high 
In place, more high in hope, 'twas fate's harsh 

will 
With tedious pain unsplendidly to kill. 
Honour to him, doom'd splendidly to die. 
Child of the city whose foster-child am I, 
Who, hotly leading up the ensanguin'd hill 
His charging thousand, fell without a word — 
Fell, but shall fall not from our memory. 
Also for them let honour's voice be heard 
Who nameless sleep, while dull time covereth 
With no illustrious shade of laurel tree. 
But with the poppy alone, their deeds and death. 

92 



SONNETS FROM "VER TENEBROSUM" 



RESTORED ALLEGIANCE 

"PjARK is thy trespass, deep be thy remorse^ 
O England ! Fittingly thine own feet bleed. 
Submissive to the purblind guides that lead 
Thy weary steps along this rugged course. 
Yet . . . when I glance abroad, and track the 

source 
More selfish far, of other nations' deed. 
And mark their tortuous craft, their jealous greed, 
Their serpent-wisdom or mere soulless force. 
Homeward returns my vagrant fealty, 
Crying, " O England, shouldst thou one day fall, 
Shatter'd in ruins by some Titan foe. 
Justice were thenceforth weaker throughout all 
The world, and Truth less passionately free. 
And God the poorer for thine overthrow." 



93 



SONNETS FROM '^VER TENEBROSUM" 



GORDON 

ARAB, Egyptian, English — by the sword 
Cloven, or pierced with spears, or bullet-mown — 
In equal fate they sleep ; their dust is grown 
A portion of the fiery sands abhorred. 
And thouj what hast thou, hero, for reward, 
Thou, England's glory and her shame ? O'er- 

thrown 
Thou liest, unburied, or with grave unknown 
As his to whom on Nebo's height the Lord 
Showed all the land of Gilead, unto Dan ; 
Judah sea-fringed ; Manasseh and Ephraim ; 
And Jericho palmy, to where Zoar lay ; 
And in a valley of Moab buried him. 
Over against Beth-Peor, but no man 
Knows of his sepulchre unto this day. 



94 



SONNETS FROM "VER TENEBROSUM 



FOREIGN MENACE 

T MARVEL that this land, whereof 1 claim 

The glory of sonship — for it was erewhile 

A glory to be sprung of Britain's isle, 

Though now it well-nigh more resembles shame — 

I marvel that this land with heart so tame 

Can brook the northern insolence and guile. 

But most it angers me, to think how vile 

Art thou, how base, from whom the insult 

came, 
Unwieldy laggard, many an age behind 
Thy sister Powers, in brain and conscience both ; 
In recognition of man's widening mind 
And flexile adaptation to its growth : 
Brute bulk, that bearest on thy back, half loth, 
One wretched man, most pitied of mankind. 



95 



SONNETS FROM ^'VER TENEBROSUM" 



HOME-ROOTEDNESS 

T CANNOT boast myself cosmopolite ; 
I own to "insularity/' although 
'Tis fall'n from fashion,, as full well I know. 
For somehow^ being a plain and simple wight, 
I am skin-deep a child of the new light, 
But chiefly am mere Englishman below, 
Of island-fostering ; and can hate a foe. 
And trust my kin before the Muscovite. 
Whom shall I trust if not my kin ? And whom 
Account so near in natural bonds as these 
Born of my mother England's mighty womb. 
Nursed on my mother England's mighty knees. 
And luird as I was lull'd in glory and gloom 
With cradle-song of her protecting seas .'' 

9Q 



SONNETS FROM "VER TENEBROSUM 



OUR EASTERN TREASURE 

TN cobwebb'd corners dusty and dim I hear 
A thin voice pipingly revived of late. 
Which saith our India is a cumbrous weight. 
An idle decoration, bought too dear. 
The wiser world contemns not gorgeous gear ; 
Just pride is no mean factor in a State ; 
The sense of greatness keeps a nation great ; 
And mighty they who mighty can appear. 
It may be that if hands of greed could steal 
From England's grasp the envied orient prize. 
This tide of gold would flood her still as now : 
But were she the same England, made to feel 
A brightness gone from out those starry eyes, 
A splendour from that constellated brow ? 

97 G 



SONNETS FROM ''VER TENEBROSUM 



NIGHTMARE 
(Written during apparent Imminence of War) 

TN a false dream I saw the Foe prevail. 
The war was ended ; the last smoke had rolled 
Away : and we, ere while the strong and bold, 
Stood broken, humbled, withered, weak and pale, 
And moan'd, " Our greatness is become a tale 
To tell our children's babes when we are old. 
They shall put by their playthings to be told 
How England once, before the years of bale. 
Throned above trembling, puissant, grandiose, calm, 
Held Asia's richest jewel in her palm ; 
And with unnumbered isles barbaric, she 
The broad hem of her glistering robe impearl'd ; 
Then, when she wound her arms about the world, 
And had for vassal the obsequious sea." 

98 



ART 



ART 

nPHE thousand painful steps at last are trod, 
At last the temple's difficult door we win ; 

But perfect on his pedestal, the god 
Freezes us hopeless when we enter in. 



L.ofC. 



99 



THE LUTE-PLAYER 



THE LUTE- PLAYER 

Q HE was a lady great and splendid, 

I was a minstrel in her halls. 
A warrior like a prince attended 

Stayed his steed by the castle walls. 

Far had he fared to gaze upon her. 

" O rest thee now, Sir Knight/' she said. 
The warrior wooed, the warrior won her. 

In time of snowdrops they were wed. 
I made sweet music in his honour, 

And longed to strike him dead. 

I passed at midnight from her portal : 
Throughout the world till death I rove : 

Ah, let me make this lute immortal 
With rapture of my hate and love ! 



100 



BEAUTY'S METEMPSYCHOSIS 



BEAUTY'S METEMPSYCHOSIS 

'T'HAT beauty such as thine 
Should die indeed. 
Were ordinance too wantonly malign ! 
No wit may reconcile so cold a creed 

With beauty such as thine. 

From wave and star and flower 
Some effluence rare 
Was lent thee, a divine but transient dower : 
Thou yield' st it back from eyes and lips and hair 

To wave and star and flower. 

Shouldst thou to-morrow die. 
Thou still shalt be 
Found in the rose and met in all the sky : 
And from the ocean's heart shalt sing to me, 

Shouldst thou to-morrow die. 



101 



RELUCTANT SUMMER 



RELUCTANT SUMMER 

"DELUCTANT Summer ! once, a maid 

Full easy of access. 
In many a bee-frequented shade 

Thou didst thy lover bless. 
Divinely unreproved I played. 

Then, with each liberal tress — 
And art thou grow^n at last afraid 

Of some too close caress ? 

Or deem'st that if thou shouldst abide 

My passion might decay ? 
Thou leav'st me pining and denied. 

Coyly thou say'st me nay. 
Ev'n as I v^^oo thee to my side. 

Thou, importuned to stay. 
Like Orpheus' half-recovered bride 

Ebb'st from my arms away. 

102 



KEATS 



KEATS 

TTE dwelt with the bright gods of elder time. 
On earth and in their cloudy haunts above. 

He loved them : and in recompense sublime, 
The gods, alas ! gave him their fatal love. 



103 



AT THE GRAVE OF CHARLES LAMB 



AT THE GRAVE OF CHARLES LAMB, 
IN EDMONTON 

I^OT here, O teeming City, was it meet 

Thy lover, thy most faithful, should repose. 

But where the multitudinous life-tide flows 

Whose ocean-murmur was to him more sweet 

Than melody of birds at morn, or bleat 

Of flocks in Spring-time, there should Earth enclose 

His earth, amid thy thronging joys and woes. 

There, 'neath the music of thy million feet. 

In love of thee this lover knew no peer. 

Thine eastern or thy western fane had made 

Fit habitation for his noble shade. 

Mother of mightier far, of none more dear. 

Not here, in rustic exile, O not here, 

Thy Elia like an alien should be laid ! 



104 



TO AUSTIN DOBSON 



TO AUSTIN DOBSON 

"Y^ES ! urban is your Muse, and owns 
An empire based on London stones ; 
Yet flow'rs, as mountain violets sweet. 
Spring from the pavement 'neath her feet. 

Of wilder birth this Muse of mine, 
Hill-cradled, and baptized with brine ; 
And 'tis for her a sweet despair 
To watch that courtly step and air ! 

Yet surely she, without reproof. 

Greeting may send from realms aloof. 

And even claim a tie in blood. 

And dare to deem it sisterhood. 
105 



TO AUSTIN DOBSON 

For well we know^ those Maidens be 
All daughters of Mnemosyne ; 
And 'neath the unifying sun. 
Many the songs — but Song is one. 



106 



LINES IN A FLYLEAF OF '^CHRISTABEL 



LINES IN A FLYLEAF OF 
"CHRISTABEL" 

TNHOSPITABLY hast thou entertained, 

O Poet, us the bidden to thy board. 

Whom in mid-feast, and while our thousand 

mouths 
Are one laudation of the festal cheer. 
Thou from thy table dost dismiss, unfilled. 
Yet loudlier thee than many a lavish host 
We praise, and oftener thy repast half-served 
Than many a stintless banquet, prodigally 
Through satiate hours prolonged ; nor praise less 

well 
Because with tongues thou hast not cloyed, and lips 
That mourn the parsimony of affluent souls. 
And mix the lamentation with the laud. 



107 



A GOLDEN HOUR 



A GOLDEN HOUR 

A BECKONING spirit of gladness seemed afloat. 

That lightly danced in laughing air before us : 
The earth was all in tune^ and you a note 
Of Nature's happy chorus. 

'Twas like a vernal morn, yet overhead 

The leafless boughs across the lane were knitting 
The ghost of some forgotten Spring, we said, 
O'er Winter's world comes flitting. 

Or was it Spring herself, that, gone astray. 

Beyond the alien frontier chose to tarry ? 

Or but some bold outrider of the May, 

Some April-emissary ? 
108 



A GOLDEN HOUR 

The apparition faded on the air^ 

Capricious and incalculable comer. — 
Wilt thou too pass, and leave my chill days bare, 
And fall'n my phantom Summer ? 



109 



BYRON THE VOLUPTUARY 



BYRON THE VOLUPTUARY 

T^OO avid of earth's bliss^ he was of those 

Whom Delight flies because they give her chase. 
Only the odour of her wild hair blows 

Back in their faces hungering for her face. 



110 



THE FUGITIVE IDEAL 



THE FUGITIVE IDEAL 

AS some most pure and noble face^ 

Seen in the thronged and hurrying street. 
Sheds o'er the world a sudden grace, 

A flying odour sweet. 
Then, passing, leaves the cheated sense 
Baulked with a phantom excellence ; 



So, on our souls the visions rise 

Of that fair life we never led : 
They flash a splendour past our eyes, 

We start, and they are fled : 
They pass, and leave us with blank gaze. 
Resigned to our ignoble days. 



Ill 



COLUMBUS 



COLUMBUS 

Tj^ROM his adventurous prime 
He dreamed the dream sublime 
Over his wandering youth 
It hungj a beckoning star. 
At last the vision fled^ 
And left him in its stead 
The scarce sublimer truth, 
The world he found afar. 



The scattered isles that stand 

Warding the mightier land 

Yielded their maidenhood 

To his imperious prow. 
112 



COLUMBUS 

The mainland within call 
Lay vast and virginal : 

In its blue porch he stood : 
No more did fate allow. 

No more ! but ah, how much. 
To be the first to touch 
The veriest azure hem 
Of that majestic robe ! 
Lord of the lordly sea, 
Earth's mightiest sailor he : 
Great Captain among them. 
The captors of the globe. 

When shall the world forget 
Thy glory and our debt, 

Indomitable soul. 
Immortal Genoese ? 
Not while the shrewd salt gale 
Whines amid shroud and sail. 

Above the rhythmic roll 

And thunder of the seas. 

113 H 



TO JAMES BROMLEY 



TO JAMES BROMLEY 
With ^^ Words worth's Grave" 

Tj^RE vandal lords with lust of gold accurst 

Deface each hallowed hillside we revere — 
Ere cities in their million-throated thirst 

Menace each sacred mere — 
Let us give thanks because one nook hath been 

Unflooded yet by desecration's wave. 
The little churchyard in the valley green 

That holds our Wordsworth's grave. 



'Twas there I plucked these elegiac blooms. 

There where he rests 'mid comrades fit and few. 

And thence I bring this growth of classic tombs, 

An offering, friend, to you — 
114 



TO JAMES BROMLEY 

You who have loved like me his simple themes, 
Loved his sincere large accent nobly plain. 

And loved the land whose mountains and whose 
streams 
Are lovelier for his strain. 



It may be that his manly chant, beside 

More dainty numbers, seems a rustic tune ; 
It may be, thought has broadened since he 
died 

Upon the century's noon ; 
It may be that we can no longer share 

The faith which from his fathers he received ; 
It may be that our doom is to despair 

Where he with joy believed ; — 



Enough that there is none since risen who 

sings 

A song so gotten of the immediate soul, 

So instant from the vital fount of things 

Which is our source and goal ; 
115 



TO JAMES BROMLEY 

And though at touch of later hands there float 
More artful tones than from his lyre he 
drew_, 

Ages may pass ere trills another note 
So sweet, so great, so true. 



116 



THE SAINT AND THE SATYR 



THE SAINT AND THE SATYR 

(Medieval Legend) 

C AINT ANTHONY the eremite 
He wandered in the wold. 

And there he saw a hoofed wight 
That blew his hands for cold. 

" What dost thou here in misery, 
That better far wert dead ? " 

The eremite Saint Anthony 
Unto the Satyr said. 

" Lorn in the wold," the thing replied, 

" I sit and make my moan, 

For all the gods I loved have died, 

And I am left alone. 
117 



THE SAINT AND THE SATYR 

" Silent in Paphos Venus sleeps, 

And Jove on Ida mute ; 
And every living creature weeps 

Pan and his perished flute. 

" The Faun, his laughing heart is broke ; 

The nymph, her fountain fails ; 
And driven from out the hollow oak 

The Hamadryad wails. 

" A God more beautiful than mine 
Hath conquered mine, they say. — 

Ah, to that fair young God of thine, 
For me I pray thee pray ! " 



118 



"THY VOICE FROM INMOST DREAMLAND^ 



nPHY voice from inmost dreamland calls 
The wastes of sleep thou makest fair ; 

Bright o'er the ridge of darkness falls 
The cataract of thy hair. 

The morn renews its golden birth : 

Thou with the vanquished night dost fade ; 

And leav'st the ponderable earth 
Less real than thy shade. 



119 



THE CATHEDRAL SPIRE 



THE CATHEDRAL SPIRE 

TT soars like hearts of hapless men who dare 
To sue for gifts the gods refuse to allot ; 

Who climb for ever toward they know not where, 
Baffled for ever by they know not what. 



120 



A DEDICATION 



A DEDICATION 
(To London, my Hostess) 

/^ITY that waitest to be sung, — 

For whom no hand 
To mighty strains the lyre hath strung 

In all this land, 
Though mightier theme the mightiest ones 

Sang not of old, 
The thrice three sisters' godlike sons 

With lips of gold,— 
Till greater voice thy greatness sing 

In loftier times. 

Suffer an alien muse to bring 

Her votive rhymes. 
121 



A DEDICATION 

Yes, alien in thy midst am I, 

Not of thy brood ; 
The nursling of a norland sky 

Of rougher mood : 
To me, thy tarrying guest, to me, 

'Mid thy loud hum. 
Strayed visions of the moor or sea 

Tormenting come. 
Above the thunder of the wheels 

That hurry by, 
From lapping of lone waves there steals 

A far-sent sigh ; 
And many a dream-reared mountain crest 

My feet have trod. 
There where thy Minster in the West 

Gropes toward God. 
Yet, from thy presence if I go, 

By woodlands deep 
Or ocean-fringes, thou, I know, 

Wilt haunt ray sleep ; 

Thy restless tides of life will foam, 

Still, in my sight ; 
122 



A DEDICATION 

Thy imperturbable dark dome 
Will crown my night. 



O sea of living waves that roll 

On golden sands. 
Or break on tragic reef and shoal 

'Mid fatal lands ; 
O forest wrought of living leaves, 

Some filled with Spring, 
Where joy life's festal raiment weaves 

And all birds sing, — 
Some trampled in the miry ways, 

Or whirled along 
By fury of tempestuous days, — 

Take thou my song ! 



For thou hast scorned not heretofore 

The gifts of rhyme 

I dropped, half faltering, at thy door. 

City sublime ; 

123 



A DEDICATION 

And though 'tis true I am but guest 

Within thy gate^ 
Unto thy hands I owe the best 

Awards of fate. 
Imperial hostess ! thanks from me 

To thee belong : 
O living forest, living sea, 

Take thou my song ! 



124 



THE DREAM OF MAN 



THE DREAM OF MAN 

nnO the eye and the ear of the Dreamer this Dream 

out of darkness flew^ 
Through the horn or the ivory portal, but he wist 

not which of the two. 

It was the Human Spirit, of all men's souls the Soul, 
Man the unwearied climber, that climbed to the 

unknown goal. 
And up the steps of the ages, the difficult steep ascent, 
Man the unwearied climber pauseless and dauntless 

went. 
^Eons rolled behind him with thunder of far retreat, 
And still as he strove he conquered and laid his foes 

at his feet. 

Inimical powers of nature, tempest and flood and fire, 

125 



THE DREAM OF MAN 

The spleen of fickle seasons that loved to baulk his 

desire, 
The breath of hostile climates, the ravage of blight 

and dearth. 
The old unrest that vexes the heart of the moody 

earth, 
The genii swift and radiant sabreing heaven with 

flame. 
He, with a keener weapon, the sword of his wit, 

overcame. 
Disease and her ravening offspring, pain with the 

thousand teeth, 
He drave into night primeval, the nethermost worlds 

beneath, 
Till the Lord of Death, the undying, ev'n Asrael the 

King, 
No more with Furies for heralds came armed with 

scourge and sting. 
But gentle of voice and of visage, by calm Age 

ushered and led, 

A guest, serenely featured, entering, woke no dread. 

And, as the rolling aeons retreated with pomp of sound, 

126 



THE DREAM OF MAN 

Man's Spirit_, grown too lordly for this mean orb to 

bound. 
By arts in his youth undreamed of his terrene fetters 

broke, 
With enterprise ethereal spurning the natal yoke, 
And, stung with divine ambition, and fired with a 

glorious greed, 
He annexed the stars and the planets and peopled 

them with his seed. 

Then said he, ^' The infinite Scripture I have read 

and interpreted clear, 
And searching all worlds I have found not my 

sovereign or my peer. 
In what room of the palace of nature resides the 

invisible God ? 
For all her doors I have opened, and all her floors I 

have trod. 
If greater than I be her tenant, let him answer my 

challenging call : 

Till then I admit no rival, but crown myself master 

of all." 

127 



THE DREAM OF MAN 

And forth as that word went bruited, by Man unto 

Man were raised 
Fanes of devout self-homage, where he who praised 

was the praised ; 
And from vast unto vast of creation the new evangel 

ran. 
And an odour of world-wide incense went up from 

Man unto Man ; 
Until, on a solemn feast-day, when the world's 

usurping lord 
At a million impious altars his own proud image 

adored, 
God spake as He stept from His ambush ; " O great 

in thine own conceit, 
I will show thee thy source, how humble, thy goal, 

for a god how unmeet." 



Thereat, by the word of the Maker the Spirit of 

Man was led 
To a mighty peak of vision, where God to His 

creature said : 

128 



THE DREAM OF MAN 

" Look eastward toward time's sunrise." And, age 

upon age untold. 
The Spirit of Man saw clearly the Past as a chart 

out-rolled, — 
Beheld his base beginnings in the depths of time, 

and his strife 
With beasts and crawling horrors for leave to live, 

when life 
Meant but to slay and to procreate, to feed and to 

sleep, among 
Mere mouths, voracities boundless, blind lusts, 

desires without tongue. 
And ferocities vast, fulfilling their being's malignant 

law. 
While nature was one hunger, and one hate, all 

fangs and maw. 



With that, for a single moment, abashed at his own 

descent, 

In humbleness Man's Spirit at the feet of the Maker 

bent ; 

129 I 



THE DREAM OF MAN 

But, swifter than light, he recovered the stature and 

pose of his pride. 
And, " Think not thus to shame me with my mean 

birth," he cried. 
'^ This is my loftiest greatness, to have been born so 

low ; 
Greater than Thou the ungrowing am I that for 

ever grow." 
And God forbore to rebuke him, but answered 

brief and stern, 
Bidding him toward time's sunset his vision west- 
ward turn ; 
And the Spirit of Man obeying beheld as a chart 

out-rolled 
The likeness and form of the Future, age upon age 

untold ; 
Beheld his own meridian, and beheld his dark decline. 
His secular fall to nadir from summits of light divine. 
Till at last, amid worlds exhausted, and bankrupt 

of force and fire, 

'Twas his, in a torrent of darkness, like a sputtering 

lamp to expire. 

130 



THE DREAM OF MAN 

Then a war of shame and anger did the realm of 

his soul divide ; 
"'Tis false, 'tis a lying vision/' in the face of his 

God he cried. 
" Thou thinkest to daunt me with shadows ; not 

such as Thou feign' st, my doom : 
From glory to rise unto glory is mine, who have 

risen from gloom. 
I doubt if Thou knew'st at my making how near to 

Thy throne I should climb, 
O'er the mountain slopes of the ages and the 

conquered peaks of time. 
Nor shall I look backward nor rest me till the 

uttermost heights I have trod. 
And am equalled with Thee or above Thee, the 

mate or the master of God." 



Ev'n thus Man turned from the Maker, with 

thundered defiance wild. 

And God with a terrible silence reproved the speech 

of His child. 

131 



THE DREAM OF MAN 

And Man returned to his labours^ and stiffened the 

neck of his will ; 
And the aeons still went rolling, and his power was 

crescent still. 
But yet there remained to conquer one foe, and 

the greatest — although 
Despoiled of his ancient terrors, at heart, as of old, 

a foe — 
Unmaker of all, and renewer, who winnows the 

world with his wing. 
The Lord of Death, the undying, ev'n Asrael the 

King. 

And lo, Man mustered his forces the war of wars to 

wage. 
And with storm and thunder of onset did the foe of 

foes engage, 
And the Lord of Death, the undying, was beset and 

harried sore. 

In his immemorial fastness at night's aboriginal core. 

And during years a thousand man leaguered his 

enemy's hold, 

132 



THE DREAM OF MAN 

While nature was one deep tremor, and the heart of 

the world waxed cold, 
Till the phantom battlements wavered, and the 

ghostly fortress fell, 
And Man with shadowy fetters bound fast great 

Asrael. 

So, to each star in the heavens, the exultant word 
was blown. 

The annunciation tremendous. Death is overthroivn ! 

And Space in her ultimate borders, prolonging the 
jubilant tone. 

With hollow ingeminations, sighed. Death is over- 
thrown ! 

And God in His house of silence, where He 
dwelleth aloof, alone. 

Paused in His tasks to hearken : Death is overthrown ! 

Then a solemn and high thanksgiving by Man unto 
Man was sung. 

In his temples of self-adoration, with his own multi- 
tudinous tongue ; 

133 



THE DREAM OF MAN 

And he said to his Soul : " Rejoice thou, for thy last 

great foe lies bound, 
Ev'n Asrael the Unmaker, unmade, disarmed, 

discrowned." 



And behold, his Soul rejoiced not, the breath of 

whose being was strife. 
For life with nothing to vanquish seemed but the 

shadow of life. 
No goal invited and promised and divinely provoca- 
tive shone ; 
And Fear having fled, her sister, blest Hope, in her 

train was gone ; 
And the coping and crown of achievement was hell 

than defeat more dire — 
The torment of all-things-compassed, the plague of 

nought-to-desire ; 
And Man the invincible queller, man with his foot 

on his foes, 

In boundless satiety hungered, restless from utter 

repose, 

134 



THE DREAM OF MAN 

Victor of nature, victor of the prince of the powers 

of the air, 
By mighty weariness vanquished, and crowned with 

august despair. 



Then, at his dreadful zenith, he cried unto God : 

" O Thou 
Whom of old in my days of striving methought I 

needed not, — now 
In this my abject glory, my hopeless and helpless 

might, 
Hearken and cheer and succour ! " and God from 

His lonely height. 
From eternity's passionless summits, on suppliant 

Man looked down, 
And his brow waxed human with pity, belying its 

awful crown. 
" Thy richest possession," He answered, " blest 

Hope, will I restore. 

And the infinite wealth of weakness which was thy 

strength of yore ; 

135 



THE DREAM OF MAN 

And I will arouse from slumber, in his hold where 

bound he lies, 
Thine enemy most benefit ; — O Asrael, hear and 

rise I 

And a sound like the heart of nature in sunder 
cloven and torn, 

Announced, to the ear universal, undying Death 
new-born. 

Sublime he rose in his fetters, and shook the chains 
aside 

Ev'n as some mortal sleeper 'mid forests in autumn- 
tide 

Rises and shakes off lightly the leaves that lightly 
fell 

On his limbs and his hair unheeded while as yet 
he shimbered well. 

And Deity paused and hearkened, then turned to 

the undivine. 

Saying, "O Man, My creature, thy lot was more 

blest than Mine. 

136 



THE DREAM OF MAN 

I taste not delight of seeking^ nor the boon of 

longing know. 
There is but one joy transcendent, and I hoard it 

not but bestow. 
I hoard it not nor have tasted, but freely I gave it 

to thee — 
The joy of most glorious striving, which dieth in 

victory." 

Thus, to the Soul of the Dreamer, this Dream out 

of darkness flew, 
Through the horn or the ivory portal, but he wist 

not which of the two. 



137 



EPIGRAM 



THOILING and yearning, 'tis man's doom to see 
No perfect creature fashion'd of his hands. 

Insulted by a flower's immaculacy, 

And mock'd at by the flawless stars he stands. 



138 



VITA NUOVA 



VITA NUOVA 

T ONG hath she slept^ forgetful of dehght : 
At last, at last, the enchanted princess. Earth, 
Claimed with a kiss by Spring the adventurer. 
In slumber knows the destined lips, and thrilled 
Through all the deeps of her unageing heart 
With passionate necessity of joy. 
Wakens, and yields her loveliness to love. 

O ancient streams, O far-descended woods 

Full of the fluttering of melodious souls ; 

O hills and valleys that adorn yourselves 

In solemn jubilation ; winds and clouds, 

Ocean and land in stormy nuptials clasped. 

And all exuberant creatures that acclaim 

The Earth's divine renewal : lo, I too 

139 



VITA NUOVA 

With yours would mingle somewhat of glad song. 

I too have come through wintry terrors, — yea. 

Through tempest and through cataclysm of soul 

Have come, and am delivered. Me the Spring, 

Me also, dimly with new life hath touched. 

And with regenerate hope, the salt of life ; 

And I would dedicate these thankful tears 

To whatsoever Power beneficent. 

Veiled though his countenance, undivulged his 

thought. 
Hath led me from the haunted darkness forth 
Into the gracious air and vernal morn. 
And suffers me to know my spirit a note 
Of this great chorus, one with bird and stream 
And voiceful mountain, — nay, a string, how jarred . 
And all but broken ! of that lyre of life 
Whereon himself, the master harp-player. 
Resolving all its mortal dissonance 
To one immortal and most perfect strain. 
Harps without pause, building with song the world. 

18th March 1893. 

140 



THE FIRST SKYLARK OF SPRING 



THE FIRST SKYLARK OF SPRING 

npWO worlds hast thou to dwell in, Sweet,- 

The virginal, untroubled sky, 
And this vext region at my feet. — 
Alas, but one have I ! 



To all my songs there clings the shade, 
The dulling shade, of mundane care. 
They amid mortal mists are made, — 
Thine, in immortal air. 



My heart is dashed with griefs and fears ; 

My song comes fluttering, and is gone. 

O high above the home of tears. 

Eternal Joy, sing on ! 
141 



THE FIRST SKYLARK OF SPRING 

Not loftiest bard, of mightiest mind, 

Shall ever chant a note so pure. 
Till he can cast this earth behind 
And breathe in heaven secure. 



We sing of Life, with stormy breath 

That shakes the lute's distempered string 
We sing of Love, and loveless Death 
Takes up the song we sing. 



And born in toils of Fate's control. 

Insurgent from the womb, we strive 
With proud, unmanumitted soul 
To burst the golden gyve. 



Thy spirit knows nor bounds nor bars ; 

On thee no shreds of thraldom hang : 

Not more enlarged, the morning stars 

Their great Te Deum sang. 
14.2 



THE FIRST SKYLARK OF SPRING 

But I am fettered to the sod. 

And but forget my bonds an hour ; 
In amplitude of dreams a god, 
A slave in dearth of power. 



And fruitless knowledge clouds my soul, 

And fretful ignorance irks it more. 
Thou sing'st as if thou knew*st the whole, 
And lightly held'st thy lore ! 



Somewhat as thou, Man once could sing. 

In porches of the lucent morn, 
Ere he had felt his lack of wing, 
Or cursed his iron bourn. 



The springtime bubbled in his throat. 

The sweet sky seemed not far above, 

And young and lovesome came the note ; — 

Ah, thine is Youth and Love ! 
143 



THE FIRST SKYLARK OF SPRING 

Thou sing'st of what he knew of old. 

And dreamlike from afar recalls ; 
In flashes of forgotten gold 
An orient glory falls. 

And as he listens, one by one 

Life's utmost splendours blaze more nigh ; 
Less inaccessible the sun. 

Less alien grows the sky. 

For thou art native to the spheres, 

And of the courts of heaven art free, 
And carriest to his temporal ears 
News from eternity ; 

And lead'st him to the dizzy verge. 

And lur'st him o'er the dazzling line, 
Where mortal and immortal merge. 
And human dies divine. 



J 44^ 



NIGHT ON CURBAR EDGE 



NIGHT ON CURBAR EDGE 

1VT0 echo of man's life pursues my ears ; 
Nothing disputes this Desolation's reign ; 
Change comes not, this dread temple to profane. 
Where time by aeons reckons, not by years. 
Its patient form one crag, sole stranded, rears. 
Type of whate'er is destined to remain 
While yon still host encamped on night's waste plain 
Keeps armed watch, a million quivering spears. 

Hushed are the wild and wing'd lives of the moor ; 

The sleeping sheep nestle 'neath ruined wall. 

Or unhewn stones in random concourse hurled : 

Solitude, sleepless, listens at Fate's door ; 

And there is built and 'stablisht over all 

Tremendous silence, older than the world. 

145 K 



EPIGRAM 



TF Nature be a phantasm, as thou say'st, 
A splendid fiction and prodigious dream, 

To reach the real and true I'll make no haste, 
More than content with worlds that only seem. 



146 



ODE TO LICINIUS 



ODE TO LICINIUS 

(Horace II. x.) 

T ICINIUS, wouldst thou wisely steer 

The pinnace of thy soul, 
Not always trust her without fear 

Where deep-sea billows roll ; 
Nor, to the sheltered beach too near, 

Risk shipwreck on the shoal. 



Who sees in fortune's golden mean 
All his desires comprised, 

Midway the cot and court between 
Hath well his life devised ; 

For riches, hath not envied been, 

Nor, for their lack, despised. 
147 



ODE TO LICINIUS 

Most rocks the pine that soars afar. 
When leaves are tempest-whirled. 

Direst the crash when turrets are 
In dusty ruin hurled. 

The thunder loveth best to scar 
The bright brows of the world. 



The steadfast mind, that to the end 

Is fortune's victor still, 
Hath yet a fear, though Fate befriend 

A hope, though all seem ill. 
Jove can at will the winter send. 

Or call the spring at will. 



Full oft the darkest day may be 
Of morrows bright the sire. 

His bow not everlastingly 
Apollo bends in ire. 

At times the silent Muses he 

Wakes with his dulcet lyre. 
148 



ODE TO LICINIUS 

When life's straits roar and hem thee sore, 

Be bold ; naught else avails. 
But when thy canvas swells before 

Too proudly prospering gales, 
For once be wise with coward's lore, 

And timely reef thy sails. 



149 



THE PLAY OF "KING LEAR" 



THE PLAY OF ^^KING LEAR" 



TTERE love the slain with Love the slayer lies ; 

Deep (Irown'd are both in the same sunless pool. 
Up from its depths that mirror thundering skies 

Bubbles the wan mirth of the mirthless Fool. 



150 



TELL ME NOT NOW 



TELL ME NOT NOW 

T^ELL me not now, if love for love 
Thou canst return, — 

Now while around us and above 

Day's flambeaux burn. 
Not in clear noon, with speech as clear, 

Thy heart avow, 
For every gossip wind to hear ; 

Tell me not now ! 



Tell rae not now the tidings sweet. 

The news divine ; 

A little longer at thy feet 

Leave me to pine. 
151 



TELL ME NOT NOW 

I would not have the gadding bird 

Hear from his bough ; 
Nay, though I famish for a word, 

Tell me not now ! 

But when deep trances of delight 

All Nature seal, 
When round the world the arms of Night 

Caressing steal. 
When rose to dreaming rose says, " Dear, 

Dearest," — and when 
Heaven sighs her secret in earth's ear. 

Ah, tell me then ! 



152 



THE FATHER OF THE FOREST 



THE FATHER OF THE FOREST 



/~^LD emperor Yew^ fantastic sire, 

Girt with thy guard of dotard kings, — 

What ages hast thou seen retire 
Into the dusk of alien things ? 

What mighty news hath stormed thy shade, 

Of armies perished, reahns unmade ? 



Ah'eady wast thou great and wise. 
And solemn with exceeding eld, 

On that proud morn when England's eyes. 
Wet with tempestuous joy, beheld 

Round her rough coasts the thundering main 

Strewn with the ruined dream of Spain. 
153 



THE FATHER OF THE FOREST 

Hardly thou count'st them long ago, 
The warring faiths, the wavering land. 

The sanguine sky's delirious glow, 

And Cranmer's scorched, uplifted hand. 

Wailed not the woods their task of shame. 

Doomed to provide the insensate flame ? 



Mourned not the rumouring winds, when she. 
The sweet queen of a tragic hour. 

Crowned with her snow-white memory 
The crimson legend of the Tower ? 

Or when a thousand witcheries lay 

Felled with one stroke, at Fotheringay ? 



Ah, thou hast heard the iron tread 
And clang of many an armoured age. 

And well recall'st the famous dead. 
Captains or counsellors brave or sage. 

Kings that on kings their myriads hurled, 

Ladies whose smile embroiled the world. 
154 



THE FATHER OF THE FOREST 

Rememberest thou the perfect knight, 
The soldier, courtier, bard in one, 

Sidney, that pensive Hesper-light 
O'er Chivalry's departed sun ? 

Knew'st thou the virtue, sweetness, lorC;, 

Whose nobly hapless name was More ? 



The roystering prince, that afterward 
Belied his madcap youth, and proved 

A greatly simple warrior lord 

Such as our warrior fathers loved — 

Lives he not still ? for Shakespeare sings 

The last of our adventurer kings. 



His battles o'er, he takes his ease. 
Glory put by, and sceptred toil. 

Round him the carven centuries 
Like forest branches arch and coil. 

In that dim fane, he is not sure 

Who lost or won at Azincour ! 
155 



THE FATHER OF THE FOREST 

Roofed by the mother minster vast 

That guards Augustine's rugged throne, 

The darling of a knightly Past 

Sleeps in his bed of sculptured stone, 

And flings, o'er many a warlike tale. 

The shadow of his dusky mail. 



The monarch who, albeit his crown 
Graced an august and sapient head, 

Rode roughshod to a stained renown 
O'er Wallace and Llewellyn dead, 

And perished in the hostile land. 

With restless heart and ruthless hand ; 



Or that disastrous king on whom 
Fate, like a tempest, early fell. 

And the dark secret of whose doom 
The Keep of Pomfret kept full well ; 

Or him that with half careless words 

On Becket drew the dastard swords ; 
156 



THE FATHER OF THE FOREST 

Or Eleanor's undaunted son. 

That, starred with idle glory, came 

Bearing from leaguered Ascalon 
The barren splendour of his fame, 

And, vanquished by an unknown bow, 

Lies vainly great at Fontevraud ; 



Or him, the footprints ot whose power 
Made mightier whom he overthrew ; 

A man built like a mountain-tower, 
A fortress of heroic thew ; 

The Conqueror, in our soil who set 

This stem of Kinghood flowering yet ;- 



These, or the living fame of these. 

Perhaps thou minglest — who shall say ?- 

With thrice remoter memories. 
And phantoms of the mistier day. 

Long ere the tanner's daughter's son 

From Harold's hands this realm had won. 
157 



THE FATHER OF THE FOREST 

What years are thine^ not mine to guess ! 

The stars look youthful, thou being by ; 
Youthful the sun's glad-heartedness ; 

Witless of time the unageing sky ! 
And these dim-groping roots around 
So deep a human Past are wound. 



That, musing in thy shade, for me 

The tidings scarce would strangely fall 

Of fair-haired despots of the sea 
Scaling our eastern island-wall. 

From their long ships of norland pine. 

Their '' surf-deer," driven o'er wilds of brine. 



Nay, hid by thee from Summer's gaze 
That seeks in vain this couch of loam, 

I should behold, without amaze, 

Camped on yon down the hosts of Rome, 

Nor start though English woodlands heard 

The self-same mandatory word 
158 



THE FATHER OF THE FOREST 

As by the Cataracts of the Nile 
Marshalled the legions long ago. 

Or where the lakes are one blue smile 
'Neath pageants of Helvetian snow, 

Or 'mid the Syrian sands that lie 

Sick of the day's great tearless eye, 



Or on barbaric plains afar, 

Where, under Asia's fevering ray, 
The long lines of imperial war 

O'er Tigris passed, and with dismay 
In fanged and iron deserts found 
Embattled Persia closing round. 



And 'mid their eagles watched on high 
The vultures gathering for a feast. 

Till, from the quivers of the sky, 
The gorgeous star-flight of the East 

Flamed, and the bow of darkness bent 

O'er Julian dying in his tent. 
159 



THE FATHER OF THE FOREST 

n 

Was it the wind befooling me 
With ancient echoes, as I lay ? 

Was it the antic fantasy 

Whose elvish mockeries cheat the dav ? 

Surely a hollow murmur stole 

From wizard bough and ghostly bole : 

" W^ho prates to me of arms and kings. 
Here in these courts of old repose ? 

Thy babble is of transient things. 
Broils, and the dust of foolish blows. 

Thy sounding annals are at best 

The witness of a world's unrest. 

" Goodly the ostents are to thee, 

And pomps of Time : to me more sweet 

The vigils of Eternity, 

And Silence patient at my. feet ; 

And dreams beyond the deadening range 

And dull monotonies of Change. 
160 



THE FATHER OF THE FOREST 

" Often an air comes idling by 
With news of cities and of men. 

I hear a multitudinous sigh^ 
And lapse into my soul again. 

Shall her great noons and sunsets be 

Blurred with thine infelicity ? 



" Now from these veins the strength of old^ 
The warmth and lust of life depart ; 

Full of mortality^ behold 

The cavern that was once my heart ! 

Me^ with blind arm^ in season due. 

Let the aerial woodman hew. 



" For not though mightiest mortals fall, 
The starry chariot hangs delayed. 

His axle is uncooled, nor shall 

The thunder of His wheels be stayed. 

A changeless pace His coursers keep. 

And halt not at the wells of sleep. 

I6l L 



THE FATHER OF THE FOREST 

" The South shall bless, the East shall blight, 
The red rose of the Dawn shall blow ; 

The million-lllied stream of Night 
Wide in ethereal meadows flow ; 

And Autumn mourn ; and everything 

Dance to the wild pipe of the Spring. 



" With oceans heedless round her feet. 
And the indifferent heavens above. 

Earth shall the ancient tale repeat 

Of wars and tears, and death and love 

And, wise from all the foolish Past, 

Shall perad venture hail at last 



" The advent of that morn divine 
When nations may as forests grow. 

Wherein the oak hates not the pine. 
Nor beeches wish the cedars woe, 

But all, in their unlikeness, blend 

Confederate to one golden end — 
162 



THE FATHER OF THE FOREST 

" Beauty : the Vision whereunto^ 

In joy, with pantings, from afar, 
Through sound and odour, form and hue. 

And mind and clay, and worm and star- 
Now touching goal, now backward hurled- 
Toils the indomitable world." 



163 



EPIGRAM 



■]U"OMENTOUS to himself as I to me 

Hath each man been that ever woman bore 

Once, in a Hghtning-flash of sympathy, 
I felt this truth, an instant, and no more. 



164 



LINES WRITTEN IN RICHMOND PARK 



LINES WRITTEN IN RICHMOND PARK 

T ADY, were you but here ! 

The Autumn flames away. 

And pensive in the antlered shade I stray. 

The Autumn flames away, his end is near. 

I Hnger where deposed and fall'n he lies, 

Prankt in his last poor tattered braveries. 

And think what brightness w^ould enhance the Day, 

Lady, were you but here. 

Though hushed the woodlands, though sedate the 

skies, 
Though dank the leaves and sere. 
The stored sunlight in your hair and eyes 
Would vernalise 

November, and renew the aged year, 
Lady ! were you but here. 

165 



THE SOVEREIGN POET 



THE SOVEREIGN POET 

LI E sits above the clang and dust of Time, 
With the world's secret trembling on his lip. 
He asks not converse nor companionship 
In the cold starlight where thou canst not climb. 

The undelivered tidings in his breast 
Suffer him not to rest. 
He sees afar the immemorable throng, 
And binds the scattered ages with a song. 

The glorious riddle of his rhythmic breath, 
His might, his spell, we know not what they be ; 
We only feel, whate'er he uttereth. 
This savours not of death. 
This hath a relish of eternity. 



166 



THE RUINED ABBEY 



THE RUINED ABBEY 

■pLOWER - FONDLED, clasp d in ivys close 
caress, 

It seems allied with Nature, yet apart : — 
Of wood's and wave's insensate loveliness 

The glad, sad, tranquil, passionate, human heart. 



67 



SONNET 



T THINK you never were of earthly frame, 
O truant from some charmed world unknown ! 
A fah*y empress, you forsook your throne. 
Fled your inviolate court, and hither came ; 
Donned mortal vesture ; wore a woman's name 
Like a mere woman, loved ; and so are grown 
At last a little human, save alone 
For the wild elvish heart not Love could tame. 
And one day I believe you will return 
To your far isle amid the enchanted sea, — 
There, in your realm, perhaps remember me. 
Perhaps forget : but I shall never learn ! 
I, loveless dust within a dreamless urn. 
Dead to your beauty's immortality. 



168 



ODE TO ARTHUR CHRISTOPHER BENSON 



ODE TO ARTHUR CHRISTOPHER BENSON 

TN that grave shade august 

That round your Eton clings. 
To you the centuries must 

Be visible corporate things. 
And the high Past appear 
Affably real and near. 
For all its grandiose airs, caught from the mien of 
Kings. 

The new age stands as yet 

Half built against the sky, 
Open to every threat 

Of storms that clamour by : 

Scaffolding veils the vralls. 

And dim dust floats and falls. 

As, moving to and fro, their tasks the masons ply. 

169 



ODE TO ARTHUR CHRISTOPHER BENSON 

But changeless and complete, 
Rise unperturbed and vast^ 
Above our din and heat. 

The turrets of the Past, 
Mute as that city asleep. 
Lulled with enchantments deep. 
Far in Arabian dreamland built where all things 
last. 

Who loves not to explore 

That palace of Old Time, 
Awed by the spires that soar 

In ghostly dusk sublime. 
And gorgeous-windowed halls. 
And leagues of pictured walls, 
And dungeons that remember many a crimson 
crime ? 

Yet, in those phantom towers 

Not thine, not mine, to dwell. 

Rapt from the living hours 

By some rich lotus-spell ; 
170 



ODE TO ARTHUR CHRISTOPHER BENSON 

And if our lute obey 
A mode of yesterday, 
*Tis that we deem 'twill prove to-morrow's mode 
as well. 



This neighbouring joy and woe — 
This present sky and sea — 

These men and things we know. 
Whose touch we would not flee — 

To us, O friend, shall long 

Yield aliment of song : 
Life as I see it lived is great enough for me. 



In high relief against 

That reverend silence set, 
Wherein your days are fenced 

From the world's peevish fret. 

There breaks on old Earth's ears 

The thunder of new years, 

Rousing from ancient dreams the Muse's anchoret. 

171 



ODE TO ARTHUR CHRISTOPHER BENSON 

Well if the coming time, 

With loud and strident tongue, 
Hush not the sound of rhyme, 

Drown not the song half sung, 
Ev-^'n as a dissonant age 
Choked with polemic rage 
The starriest voice that e'er on English ears hath 
rung. 

And bade her seer a while 

Pause and put by the bard, 
Till this tormented isle. 

With feuds and factions jarred. 
Some leisure might regain 
To hear the long-pent strain 
Re-risen from storm and fire, immortal and un- 
marred. 



172 



HYMN TO THE SEA 



HYMN TO THE SEA 



/?j_RANT; O regal in bounty, a subtle and delicate 

largess ; 

Grant an ethereal alms_, out of the wealth of thy 

soul : 

Suffer a tarrying minstrel, who finds, not fashions 

his numbers, — 

Who, from the commune of air, cages the volatile 

song,— 

Here to capture and prison some fugitive breath 

of thy descant. 

Thine and his own as thy roar lisped on the 

lips of a shell, 

173 



HYMN TO THE SEA 

Now while the vernal impulsion makes lyrical all 
that hath language^ 
While, through the veins of the Earth, riots the 
ichor of Spring, 
While, with throes, with raptures, with loosing of 
bonds, with unsealings, — 
Arrowy pangs of delight, piercing the core of 
the world, — 
Tremors and coy unfoldings, reluctances, sweet 
agitations, — 
Youth, irrepressibly fair, wakes like a wondering 
rose. 

n 

Lover whose vehement kisses on lips irresponsive 

are squandered. 

Lover that wooest in vain Earth's imperturbable 

heart ; 

Athlete mightily frustrate, who pittest thy thews 

against legions. 

Locked with fantastical hosts, bodiless arms of 

the sky ; 

174 



HYMN TO THE SEA 

Sea that breakest for ever^ that breakest and never 
art broken. 
Like unto thine, from of old, springeth the spirit 
of man, — 
Nature's wooer and fighter, whose years are a suit 
and a wresthng. 
All their hours, from his birth^ hot with desire 
and with fray ; 
Amorist agonist man, that, immortally pining and 
striving. 
Snatches the glory of life only from love and 
from war ; 
Man that, rejoicing in conflict, like thee when pre- 
cipitate tempest. 
Charge after thundering charge, clangs on thy 
resonant mail, 
Seemeth so easy to shatter, and proveth so hard 
to be cloven ; 
Man whom the gods, in his pain, curse with a 
soul that endures ; 
Man whose deeds, to the doer, come back as thine 

own exhalations 

175 



HYMN TO THE SEA 

Into thy bosom return_, weepings of mountain and 

vale ; 

Man with the cosmic fortunes and starry vicissitudes 

tangled. 

Chained to the wheel of the world, blind with 

the dust of its speed. 

Even as thou, O giant, whom trailed in the wake 

of her conquests 

Night's sweet despot draws, bound to her ivory 

car; 

Man with inviolate caverns, impregnable holds in 

his nature, 

Depths no storm can pierce, pierced with a shaft 

of the sun : 

Man that is galled with his confines, and burdened 

yet more with his vastness. 

Born too great for his ends, never at peace with 

his goal ; 

Man whom Fate, his victor, magnanimous, clement 

in triumph, 

Holds as a captive king, mewed in a palace 

divine : 

176 



HYMN TO THE SEA 

Wide its leagues of pleasance^ and ample of purview 
its windows ; 
Airily falls^ in its courts^ laughter of fountains 
at play ; 
Nought;, when the harpers are harping, untimely 
reminds him of durance ; 
None, as he sits at the feast, whisper Captivity's 
name ; 
But, would he parley with Silence, withdraw for 
awhile unattended, 
Forth to the beckoning world 'scape for an hour 
and be free, 
Lo, his adventurous fancy coercing at once and 
provoking. 
Rise the unscalable walls, built with a word at 
the prime ; 
Lo, immobile as statues, with pitiless faces of 
iron. 
Armed at each obstinate gate, stand the im- 
passable guards. 

177 M 



HYMN TO THE SEA 



III 

Miser whose coffered recesses the spoils of eternity 

cumber, 

Spendthrift foaming thy soul wildly in fury 

away, — 

We, self-amorous mortals, our own multitudinous 

image 

Seeking in all we behold, seek it and find it in 

thee : 

Seek it and find it when o'er us the exquisite fabric 

of Silence 

Perilous-turreted hangs, trembles and dulcetly 

falls ; 

When the aerial armies engage amid orgies of music. 

Braying of arrogant brass, whimper of querulous 

reeds ; 

When, at his banquet, the Summer is purple and 

drowsed with repletion ; 

When, to his anchorite board, taciturn Winter 

repairs ; 

178 



HYMN TO THE SEA 

When by the tempest are scattered magnificent 

ashes of Autumn ; 
When, upon orchard and lane, breaks the white 

foam of the Spring : 
When, in extravagant revel, the Dawn, a bacchante 

upleaping. 
Spills, on the tresses of Night, vintages golden 

and red ; 
When, as a token at parting, munificent Day, for 

remembrance. 
Gives, unto men that forget, Ophirs of fabulous 

ore ; 
When, invincibly rushing, in luminous palpitant 

deluge. 
Hot from the summits of Life, poured is the lava 

of noon ; 
When, as yonder, thy mistress, at height of her 

mutable glories. 
Wise from the magical East, comes like a sorceress 

pale. 

Ah, she comes, she arises, — impassive, emotionless, 

bloodless, 

179 



HYMN TO THE SEA 

Wasted and ashen of cheeky zoning her ruins with 
pearl. 
Once she was warm^ she was joyous^ desire in her 
pulses abounding : 
Surely thou lovedst her well, then, in her con- 
quering youth ! 
Surely not all unimpassioned, at sound of thy rough 
serenading. 
She, from the balconied night, unto her melodist 
leaned, — 
Leaned unto thee, her bondsman, who keepest 
to-day her commandments. 
All for the sake of old love, dead at thy heart 
though it lie. 



IV 



Yea, it is we, light perverts, that M'aver, and shift 

our allegiance ; 

We, whom insurgence of blood dooms to be barren 

and waste ; 

180 



HYMN TO THE SEA 

We, unto Nature imputing our frailties, our fever 

and tumult ; 

We, that with dust of our strife sully the hue of 

her peace. 

Thou, with punctual service, fulfillest thy task, being 

constant ; 

Thine but to ponder the Law, labour and greatly 

obey : 

Wherefore, with leapings of spirit, thou chantest 

the chant of the faithful, 

Chantest aloud at thy toil, cleansing the Earth of 

her stain ; 

Leagued in antiphonal chorus with stars and the 

populous Systems, 

Following these as their feet dance to the rhyme 

of the Suns ; 

Thou thyself but a billow, a ripple, a dropof thatOcean, 

Which, labyrinthine of arm, folding us meshed 

in its coil. 

Shall, as now, with elations, august exultations and 

ardours. 

Pour, in unfaltering tide, all its unanimous waves, 

181 



HYMN TO THE SEA 

When, from this threshold of being, these steps of 
the Presence, this precinct, 
Into the matrix of Life darkly divinely resumed, 
Man and his littleness perish, erased like an error 
and cancelled, 
Man and his greatness survive, lost in the great- 
ness of God. 



182 



EPIGRAM 



TN mid whirl of the dance of Time ye start, 
Start at the cold touch of Eternity, 

And cast your cloaks about you, and depart. — 
The minstrels pause not in their minstrelsy. 



183 



FRANCE 



FRANCE 
25th June 1894<* 

T IGHT-HEARTED heroine of tragic story ! 
Nation whom storm on storm of ruining fate 
Unruined leaves, — nay, fairer, more elate. 
Hungrier for action, more athirst for glory ! 
World-witching queen, from fiery floods and gory 
Rising eternally regenerate. 
Clothed with great deeds and crowned with dreams 

more great 
Spacious as Fancy's boundless territory ! 

Little thou lov'st our island, and perchance 
Thou heed'st as little her reluctant praise ; 
Yet let her, in these dark and bodeful days. 
Sinking old hatreds 'neath the sundering brine. 
Immortal and indomitable France, 
Marry her tears, her alien tears, to thine. 
* The day after the murder of Carnot. 

184 



A RIDDLE OF THE THAMES 



A RIDDLE OF THE THAMES 

AT windows that from Westminster 

Look southward to the Lollard's Tower, 
She sat, my lovely friend. A blur 

Of gilded mist, — ('twas morn's first hour,)- 
Made vague the world : and in the gleam 
Shivered the half-awakened stream. 



Through tinted vapour looming large, 
Ambiguous shapes obscurely rode. 

She gazed where many a laden barge 
Like some dim-moving saurian showed. 

And 'midst them, lo ! two swans appeared. 

And proudly up the river steered. 
185 



A RIDDLE OF THE THAMES 

Two stately swans ! What did they there ? 

Whence came they ? Whither would they go ? 
Think of them, — things so faultless fair, — 

'Mid the black shipping down below ! 
On through the rose and gold they passed, 
And melted in the morn at last. 

Ah, can it be, that they had come. 
Where Thames in sullied glory flows, 

Fugitive rebels, tired of some 
Secluded lake's ornate repose. 

Eager to taste the life that pours 

Its muddier wave 'twixt mightier shores ? 

We ne'er shall know : our wonderment 

No barren certitude shall mar. 
They left behind them, as they went, 

A dream than knowledge ampler far ; 
And from our world they sailed away 
Into some visionary day. 



186 



THE YEAR'S MINSTRELSY 



THE YEAR'S MINSTRELSY 

QPRING^ the low prelude of a lordlier song : 
Summer, a music without hint of death : 

Autumn, a cadence lingeringly long : 

Winter, a pause ; — the Minstrel- Year takes breath. 



187 



A STUDY IN CONTRASTS 



A STUDY IN CONTRASTS 

1 

T^Y cliff and chine, and hollow-nestling wood 
Thrilled with the poignant savour of the sea. 
All in the crisp light of a wintry morn. 
We walked, my friend and I, preceded still 
By one whose silken and voluminous suit, 
His courtly ruff, snow-pure 'mid golden tan. 
His grandly feathered legs slenderly strong, 
The broad and flowing billow of his breast. 
His delicate ears and superfine long nose. 
With that last triumph, his distinguished tail. 
In their collective glory spoke his race 
The flower of Collie aristocracy. 

Yet, from his traits, how absent that reserve, 

188 



A STUDY IN CONTRASTS 

That stillness on a base of power^ which marks. 

In men and mastiffs^ the selectly sprung ! 

For after all, his high-life attributes. 

His trick of doing nothing with an air. 

His salon manners and society smile. 

Were but skin-deep, factitious, and you saw 

The bustling despot of the mountain flock, 

And pastoral dog-of-all-work, underlie 

The fashionable modern lady's pet, — 

Industrial impulses bereft of scope, 

Duty and discipline denied an aim. 

Ancestral energy and strenuousness 

In graceful trifling frittered all away. 

Witness the depth of his concern and zeal 

About minutest issues : shall we take 

This path or that ? — it matters not a straw — 

But just a moment unresolved we stand, 

And all his personality, from ears 

To tip of tail, is interrogative ; 

And when from pure indifference we decide, 

How he vociferates ! how he bounds ahead ! 

With what enthusiasm he ratifies, 

189 



A STUDY IN CONTRASTS 

Applauds, acclaims our choice 'twixt right and left. 
As though some hoary problem over which 
The world had puckered immemorial brows. 
Were solved at last, and all life launched anew ! 

These and a thousand tricks and ways and traits 

I noted as of Demos at their root. 

And foreign to the staid, conservative, 

Came-over-with-the-Conqueror type of mind. 

And then, his nature, how impressionable, 

How quickly moved to Collie mirth or woe. 

Elated or dejected at a word ! 

And how unlike your genuine Vere de Vere's 

Frigid, indifferent, half-ignoring glance 

At everything outside the sacred pale 

Of things De Veres have sanctioned from the 

Flood, 
The unweariable curiosity 
And universal open-mindedness 
Of that all-testing, all-inquisitive nose ! 



190 



A STUDY IN CONTRASTS 



II 

Soj to my friend's house, back we strolled ; and 

there — 

We loitering in the garden — from her post 

Of purview at a window, languidly 

A great Angora watched his CoUieship, 

And throned in monumental calm, surveyed 

His effervescence, volatility. 

Clamour on slight occasion, fussiness. 

Herself immobile, imperturbable, 

Like one whose vision seeks the Immanent 

Behind these symbols and appearances, 

The face within this transitory mask. 

And as her eyes with indolent regard 

Viewed his upbubblings of ebullient life. 

She seemed the Orient Spirit incarnate, lost 

In contemplation of the Western Soul I 

Ev'n so, methought, the genius of the East, 

Reposeful, patient, undemonstrative. 

Luxurious, enigmatically sage, 
191 



A STUDY IN CONTRASTS 

Dispassionately cruel, might look down 

On all the fever of the Occident ; — 

The brooding mother of the unfilial world. 

Recumbent on her own antiquity. 

Aloof from our mutations and unrest, 

Alien to our achievements and desires. 

Too proud alike for protest or assent 

When new thoughts thunder at her massy door ;- 

Another brain dreaming another dream. 

Another heart recalling other loves. 

Too grey and grave for our adventurous hopes, 

For our precipitate pleasures too august, 

And in majestic taciturnity 

Refraining her illimitable scorn. 



192 



TO RICHARD HOLT HUTTON 



TO RICHARD HOLT HUTTON 

"VTES, I have had my griefs ; and yet 
I think that when I shake off life's annoy, 
I shall, in my last hour, forget 
All things that were not joy. 

Have I not watched the starry throngs 
Dance, and the soul of April break in bud ? 
Have I not taken Schubert's songs 
Into my brain and blood ? 

I have seen the morn one laugh of gold ; 

I have known a mind that was a match for Fate ; 

I have wondered what the heavens can hold 

Than simplest love more great. 

193 " N 



TO RICHARD HOLT HUTTON 

And not uncrowned with honours ran 
My days^ and not without a boast shall end ! 
For I was Shakespeare's countryman ; 
And wert thou not my friend ? 



194 



EPIGRAM 



T^HE beasts in field are glad, and have not wit 
To know why leapt their hearts when springtime 
shone. 

Man looks at his own bliss, considers it, 

Weighs it with curious fingers ; and 'tis gone. 



195 



DOMINE, QUO VADIS? 



DOMINE, QUO VADIS? 
A Legend of the Early Church 

T^ARKENING the azure roof of Nero's world, 
From smouldering Rome the smoke of ruin curled ; 
And the fierce populace went clamouring — 
"These Christian dogs, 'tis they have done this thing!" 
So to the wild wolf Hate were sacrificed 
The panting, huddled flock whose crime was Christ. 

Now Peter lodged in Rome, and rose each morn 

Looking to be ere night in sunder torn 

By those blind hands that with inebriate zeal 

Burned the strong Saints, or broke them on the 

wheel, 

Or flung them to the lions to make mirth 

For dames that ruled the lords that ruled the earth. 

196 



DOMINE, QUO VADIS? 

And unto him, their towering rocky hold_, 
Repaired those sheep of the Good Shepherd's fold 
In whose white fleece as yet no blood or foam 
Bare witness to the ravening fangs of Rome. 
" More lightj more cheap/' they cried, '^ we hold our 

lives 
Than chaff the flail or dust the whirlwind drives : 
As chaff they are winnowed and as dust are blown ; 
Nay, they are nought ; but priceless is thine own. 
Not in yon streaming shambles must thou die ; 
We counsel, we entreat, we charge thee, fly ! " 
And Peter answered : " Nay, my place is here ; 
Through the dread storm, this ship of Christ I steer. 
Blind is the tempest, deaf the roaring tide. 
And I, His pilot, at the helm abide." 

Then one stood forth, the flashing of whose soul 

Enrayed his presence like an aureole. 

Eager he spake ; his fellows, ere they heard. 

Caught from his eyes the swift and leaping word. 

" Let us, His vines, be in the wine-press trod, 

And poured a beverage for the lips of God ; 

197 



DOMINE, QUO VADIS? 

Or, ground as wheat of His eternal field, 

Bread for His table let our bodies yield. 

Behold, the Church hath other use for thee 

Thy safety is her own, and thou must flee. 

Ours be the glory at her call to die. 

But quick and whole God needs His great ally." 

And Peter said : " Do lords of spear and shield 

Thus leave their hosts uncaptained on the field. 

And from some mount of prospect watch afar 

The havoc of the hurricane of war } 

Yet, if He wills it. . . . Nay, my task is plain, — 

To serve, and to endure, and to remain. 

But weak I stand, and I beseech you all 

Urge me no more, lest at a touch I fall." 



There knelt a noble youth at Peter's feet, 

And like a viol's strings his voice was sweet. 

A suppliant angel might have pleaded so. 

Crowned with the splendour of some starry woe. 

He said : " My sire and brethren yesterday 

The heathen did with ghastly torments slay. 

198 



DOMINE, QUO VADIS? 

Pain, like a worm, beneath their feet they trod. 
Their souls went up like incense unto God. 
An offering richer yet, can Heaven require ? 

live, and be my brethren and my sire." 

And Peter answered : " Son, there is small need 
That thou exhort me to the easier deed. 
Rather I would that thou and these had lent 
Strength to uphold, not shatter, my intent. 
Already my resolve is shaken sore. 

1 pray thee, if thou love me, say no more." 



And even as he spake, he went apart. 

Somewhat to hide the brimming of his heart, 

Wherein a voice came flitting to and fro. 

That now said " Tarry ! " and anon said " Go ! " 

And louder every moment, " Go ! " it cried. 

And " Tarry ! " to a whisper sank, and died. 

And as a leaf when summer is o'erpast 

Hangs trembling ere it fall in some chance blast. 

So hung his trembling purpose and fell dead ; 

And he arose, and hurried forth, and fled, 

199 



DOMINE, QUO VADIS? 

Darkness conniving, through the Capuan Gate, 
From all that heaven of love, that hell of hate, 
To the Campania glimmering wide and still, 
And strove to think he did his Master's will. 

But spectral eyes and mocking tongues pursued. 

And with vague hands he fought a phantom 

brood. 

Doubts, like a swarm of gnats, o'erhung his flight. 

And " Lord," he prayed, " have I not done aright ? 

Can I not, living, more avail for Thee 

Than whelmed in yon red storm of agony ? 

The tempest, it shall pass, and I remain, 

Not from its fiery sickle saved in vain. 

Are there no seeds to sow, no desert lands 

Waiting the tillage of these eager hands. 

That I should beastlike 'neath the butcher fall. 

More fruitlessly than oxen from the stall ? 

Is earth so easeful, is men's hate so sweet, 

Are thorns so welcome unto sleepless feet. 

Have death and heaven so feeble lures, that I, 

Choosing to live, should win rebuke thereby ? 

200 



DOMINE, QUO VADIS? 

Not mine the dread of pain, the hist of bhss ! 
Master who judgest, have I done amiss?" 

Lo, on the darkness brake a wandering ray : 
A vision flashed along the Appian Way. 
Divinely in the pagan night it shone — 
A mournful Face — a Figure hurrying on — 
Though haggard and dishevelled, frail and worn, 
A King, of David's lineage, crowned with thorn. 
" Lord, whither farest } " Peter, wondering, cried. 
" To Rome," said Christ, " to be re-crucified." 

Into the night the vision ebbed like breath ; 
And Peter turned, and rushed on Rome and 
death. 



201 



TO AUBREY DE VERE 



TO AUBREY DE VERE 

TDOET^ whose grave and strenuous lyre is still 
For Truth and Duty strung; whose art eschews 
The lighter graces of the softer Muse, 
Disdainful of mere craftsman's idle skill : 
Yours is a soul from visionary hill 
Watching and hearkening for ethereal news. 
Looking beyond life's storms and death's cold dews 
To habitations of the eternal Avill. 

Not mine your mystic creed ; not mine, in prayer 
And worship, at the ensanguined Cross to kneel ; 
But when I mark your faith how pure and fair. 
How based on love, on passion for man's weal, 
My mind, half envying what it cannot share. 
Reveres the reverence which it cannot feel. 



202 



CHRISTMAS DAY 



CHRISTMAS DAY 

T^HE morn broke bright : the thronging people wore 

Their best ; but in the general face I saw 

No touch of veneration or of awe. 

Christ's natal day ? 'Twas merely one day more 

On which the mart agreed to close its door ; 

A lounging-time by usage and by law 

Sanctioned ; nor recked they, beyond this, one straw 

Of any meaning which for man it bore ! 

Fated among time's fallen leaves to stray, 
We breathe an air that savours of the tomb, 
Heavy with dissolution and decay ; 
Waiting till some new world-emotion rise. 
And with the shattering might of the simoom 
Sweep clean this dying Past that never dies. 



203 



TO A LADY 



TO A LADY RECOVERED FROM A 
DANGEROUS SICKNESS 

T IFE plucks thee back as by the golden hair — 
Life, who had feigned to let thee go but now. 
Wealthy is Death already, and can spare 
Ev'n such a prey as thou. 



204 



A NEW NATIONAL ANTHEM 



A NEW NATIONAL ANTHEM 

/^OD save our ancient land, 
God bless our noble land, 

God save this land ! 
Yea, from war's pangs and fears, 
Plague's tooth and famine's tears, 
Ev'n unto latest years 

God save this land ! 

God bless our reigning race ! 

Truth, honour, wisdom, grace. 

Guide their right hand ! 

Yet, though we love their sway, 

England is more than they : 

God bless their realm, we pray, 

God save our land ! 
205 



A NEW NATIONAL ANTHEM 

Too long the gulf betwixt 
This man and that man fixt 

Yawns yet unspanned. 
Too long, that some may rest, 
Tired millions toil unblest. 
God lift our lowliest, 

God save this land ! 

God save our ancient land, 
God bless our noble land, 

God save our land ! 
Earth's empires wax and wane, 
Man's might is mown as grain : 
God's arm our arm sustain ! 

God save our land ! 



206 



EPIGRAM 



'T^O Art we go as to a well, athirst, 

And see our shadow 'gainst its mimic skies, 

But in its depth must plunge and be immersed 
To clasp the naiad Truth where low she lies. 



207 



SONNET 



SONNET 

T THINK the immortal servants of mankind^ 
Who, from their graves, watch by how slow degrees 
The World-Soul greatens with the centuries, 
Mourn most Man's barren levity of mind. 
The ear to no grave harmonies inclined. 
The witless thirst for false wit's worthless lees, 
The laugh mistimed in tragic presences, 
The eye to all majestic meanings blind. 

O prophets, martyrs, saviours, ye were great. 

All truth being great to you : ye deemed Man more 

Than a dull jest, God's ennui to amuse : 

The world, for you, held purport : Life ye wore 

Proudly, as Kings their solemn robes of state ; 

And humbly, as the mightiest monarchs use. 



208 



^a DO NOT ASK" 



T DO not ask to have my fill 
Of wine, or love, or fame. 

I do not, for a little ill. 
Against the gods exclaim. 

One boon of Fortune I implore, 
With one petition kneel : 

At least caress me not, before 
Thou break me on thy 'wheel. 



209 



ODE IN MAY 



ODE IN MAY 



T ET me go forth, and share 
The overflowing Sun 
With one wise friend, or one 
Better than wise, being fair, 
Where the pewit wheels and dips 
On heights of bracken and hng. 
And Earth, unto her leaflet tips. 
Tingles with the Spring. 



What is so sweet and dear 

As a prosperous morn in May, 

The confident prime of the day, 

And the dauntless youth of the year, 
210 



ODE IN MAY 

When nothing that asks for bliss. 
Asking aright, is denied. 
And half of the world a bridegroom is. 
And half of the world a bride ? 

The Song of Mingling flows. 

Grave, ceremonial, pure. 

As once, from lips that endure. 

The cosmic descant rose. 

When the temporal lord of life. 

Going his golden way. 

Had taken a wondrous maid to wife 

That long had said him nay. 

For of old the Sun, our sire. 

Came wooing the mother of men, 

Earth, that was virginal then. 

Vestal fire to his fire. 

Silent her bosom and coy, 

But the strong god sued and pressed ; 

And born of their starry nuptial joy 

Are all that drink of her breast. 
211 



ODE IN MAY 

And the triumph of him that begot, 
And the travail of her that bore, 
Behold, they are evermore 
As warp and weft in our lot. 
We are children of splendour and fame, 
Of shuddering, also, and tears. 
Magnificent out of the dust we came, 
And abject from the Spheres. 

O bright irresistible lord, 

We are fruit of Earth's womb, each one, 

And fruit of thy loins, O Sun, 

Whence first was the seed outpoured. 

To thee as our Father we bow, 

Forbidden thy Father to see. 

Who is older and greater than thou, as thou 

Art greater and older than we. 

Thou art but as a word of his speech. 

Thou art but as a wave of his hand ; 

Thou art brief as a glitter of sand 

'Twixt tide and tide on his beach ; 
212 



ODE IN MAY 

Thou art less than a spark of his fire, 

Or a moment's mood of his soul : 

Thou art lost in the notes on the lips 

of his choir 
That chant the chant of the Whole. 



213 



SONG 



SONG 

/^H, like a queen's her happy tread. 
And like a queen's her golden head ! 
But oh, at last, when all is said. 
Her woman's heart for me ! 



We wandered where the river gleamed 
'Neath oaks that mused and pines that dreamed. 
A wild thing of the woods she seemed. 
So proud, and pure, and free ! 



All heaven drew nigh to hear her sing, 

When from her lips her soul took wing ; 

The oaks forgot their pondering. 

The pines their reverie. 
214 



SONG 

And oh, her happy queenly tread, 
And oh, her queenly golden head ! 
But oh, her heart, when all is said. 
Her woman's heart for me ! 



215 



THE WORLD IN ARMOUR 



THE WORLD IN ARMOUR 



TTNDER this shade of crimson wings abhorred 
That never wholly leaves the sky serene^ — 
While Vengeance sleeps a sleep so light, between 
Dominions that acclaim Thee overlord_, — 
Sadly the blast of Thy tremendous word, 
Whate'er its mystic purport may have been. 
Echoes across the ages, Nazarene : 
Not to bring peace Mine errand, hut a sivord. 

For lo, Thy world uprises and lies down 

In armour, and its Peace is War, in all 

Save the great death that weaves War's dreadful 

crown ; 

War unennobled by heroic pain, 

War where none triumph, none sublimely fall. 

War that sits smiling, with the eyes of Cain. 

216 



THE WORLD IN ARMOUR 



II 

When London's Plague, that day by day enrolled 

His thousands dead, nor deigned his rage to abate 

Till grass was green in silent Bishopsgate, 

Had come and passed like thunder, — still, 'tis told. 

The monster, driven to earth, in hovels old 

And haunts obscure, though dormant, lingered late. 

Till the dread Fire, one roaring wave of fate. 

Rose, and swept clean his last retreat and hold. 

In Europe live the dregs of Plague to-day, 
Dregs of full many an ancient Plague and dire, 
Old wrongs, old lies of ages blind and cruel. 
What if alone the world-war's world-wide fire 
Can purge the ambushed pestilence away ? 
Yet woe to him that idly Hghts the fuel ! 



217 



THE WORLD IN ARMOUR 



III 

A moment's fantasy, the vision came 
Of Europe dipped in fiery death, and so 
Mounting re-born, with vestal limbs aglow. 
Splendid and fragrant from her bath of flame. 
It fleeted ; and a phantom without name. 
Sightless, dismembered, terrible, said : " Lo, 
/ am that ravished Europe men shall know 
After the morn of blood and night of shame." 

The spectre passed, and I beheld alone 
The Europe of the present, as she stands. 
Powerless from terror of her own vast power, 
Neath novel stars, beside a brink unknown ; 
And round her the sad Kings, with sleepless hands. 
Piling the fagots, hour by doomful hour. 



218 



TO A FRIEND 



TO A FRIEND 

Uniting Antiquarian Tastes with 
Progressive Politics 

T^RUE lover of the Past, who dost not scorn 
To give good heed to what the Future saith, — 
Drinking the air of two worhls at a breath, 
Thou hvest not alone in thoughts outworn, 
But ever helpest the new time be born, 
Though with a sigh for the old order's death ; 
As clouds that crown the night that perisheth 
Aid in the high solemnities of morn. 

Guests of the ages, at To-morrow's door 

Why shrink we ? The long track behind us lies. 

The lamps gleam and the music throbs before. 

Bidding us enter : and I count him wise, 

Who loves so well Man's noble memories 

He needs must love Man's nobler hopes yet more. 

219 



AN EPITAPH 



AN EPITAPH 



TTIS friends he loved. His fellest earthly foes — 
Cats — I believe he did but feign to hate. 

My hand will miss the insinuated nose. 

Mine eyes the tail that wagg'd contempt at 
Fate. 



220 



PEACE AND WAR 



PEACE AND WAR 

'T^HE sleek sea, gorged and sated, basking lies ; 
The cruel creature fawns and blinks and purrs ; 
And almost we forget what fangs are hers, 
And trust for once her emerald-golden eyes ; 
Though haply on the morrow she shall rise 
And summon her infernal ministers, 
And charge her everlasting barriers, 
With wild white fingers snatching at the skies. 

So, betwixt Peace and War, man's life is cast ; 
Yet hath he dreamed of perfect Peace at last 
Shepherding all the nations ev'n as sheep. 
The inconstant, moody ocean shall as soon, 
At the cold dictates of the bloodless moon, 
Swear an eternity of halcyon sleep. 



221 



TO 



TO 



Tj^ORGET not, brother singer ! that though Prose 
Can never be too truthful or too wise, 

Song is not Truth, not Wisdom, but the rose 
Upon Truth's lips, the light in Wisdom's eyes. 



222 



IMITATION OF THE ELIZABETHANS 



SONG IN IMITATION OF THE 
ELIZABETHANS 

QWEETEST sweets that time hath rifled, 

Live anew on lyric tongue — 
Tresses w^ith which Paris trifled. 

Lips to Antony's that clung. 
These surrender not their rose, 
Nor their golden puissance those. 



Vain the envious loam that covers 
Her of Egypt, her of Troy : 

Helen's, Cleopatra's lovers 
Still desire them, still enjoy. 

Fate but stole what Song restored : 

Vain the aspic, vain the cord. 
223 



IMITATION OF THE ELIZABETHANS 

Idly clanged the sullen portal. 

Idly the sepulchral door : 
Fame the mighty, Love the immortal, 

These than foolish dust are more : 
Nor may captive Death refuse 
Homage to the conquering Muse. 



224 



EPIGRAM 



X^OR metaphors of man we search the skies^ 
And find our allegory in all the air. 

We gaze on Nature with Narcissus-eyes, 
Enamour'd of our shadow everywhere. 



225 



THE FRONTIER 



THE FRONTIER 

AT the hushed brink of twilight, — when, as though 
Some solemn journeying phantom paused to lay 
An ominous finger on the awestruck day, 
Earth holds her breath till that great presence go, — 
A moment comes of visionary glow. 
Pendulous 'twixt the gold hour and the grey, 
Lovelier than these, more eloquent than they 
Of memory, foresight, and life's ebb and flow. 

So have I known, in some fair woman's ftice. 

While viewless yet was Time's more gross imprint. 

The first, faint, hesitant, elusive hint 

Of that invasion of the vandal years 

Seem deeper beauty than youth's cloudless grace. 

Wake subtler dreams, and touch me nigh to tears. 



226 



THE LURE 



THE LURE 

/^OME hither and behold them, Sweet- 
The fairy prow that o'er me rides, 

And white sails of a lagging Fleet 
On idle tides. 

Come hither and behold them. Sweet — 
The lustrous gloom, the vivid shade. 

The throats of love that burn and beat 
And shake the glade. 

Come, for the hearts of all things pine, 
And all the paths desire thy feet, 

And allfthis beauty asks for thine. 
As I do. Sweet ! 

227 



EPIGRAM 



T OVE, like a bird, hath perch'd upon a spray 
For thee and me to hearken what he sings. 

Contented, he forgets to fly away ; 

But hush ! . . . remind not Eros of his wings. 



228 



THE PROTEST 



THE PROTEST 

"DID rae no more to other eyes 
With wandering worship fare. 

And weave my numbers garland-wise 
To crown anotiier's hair. 

On me no more a mandate lay 

Thou wouldst not have me to obey ! 



Bid me no more to leave unkissed 
That rose-wreathed porch of pearl. 

Shall I, where'er the winds may list. 
Give them my life to whirl ? 

Perchance too late thou wilt be fain 

Thy exile to recall — in vain. 
229 



THE PROTEST 

Bid me no more from thee depart, 

For in thy voice to-day 
I hear the tremor of thy heart 

Entreating me to stay ; 
I hear . . . nay, silence tells it best, 
O yielded lips, O captive breast ! 



230 



"SINCE LIFE IS ROUGH" 



OINCE Life is rough. 
Sing smoothly, O Bard. 

Enough, enough. 

To have found Life hard ! 

No record Art keeps 

Of her travail and throes. 
There is toil on the steeps ; 

On the summits, repose. 



asi 



THE TOMB OF BURNS 



THE TOMB OF BURNS 

T^TTHAT woos the world to yonder shrine ? 
What sacred clay, what dust divine ? 
Was this some Master faultless-fine, 

In whom we praise 
The cunning of the jewelled line 

And carven phrase ? 



A searcher of our source and goal, 

A reader of God's secret scroll ? 

A Shakespeare, flashing o'er the whole 

Of man's domain 

The splendour of his cloudless soul 

And perfect brain ? 
232 



THE TOMB OF BURNS 

Some Keats, to Grecian gods allied. 
Clasping all Beauty as his bride ? 
Some Shelley, soaring dim-descried 

Above Time's throng, 
And heavenward hurling wild and wide 

His spear of song ? 



A lonely Wordsworth, from the crowd 
Half hid in light, half veiled in cloud ? 
A sphere-born Milton cold and proud. 

In hallowing dews 
Dipt, and with gorgeous ritual vowed 

Unto the Muse ? 



Nay, none of these, — and little skilled 

On heavenly heights to sing and build ! 

Thine, thine, O Earth, whose fields he tilled. 

And thine alone. 

Was he whose fiery heart lies stilled 

'Neath yonder stone. 
233 



THE TOMB OF BURNS 

He came when poets had forgot 
How rich and strange the human lot ; 
How warm the tints of Life ; how hot 

Are Love and Hate ; 
And what makes Truth divine, and what 

Makes Manhood great. 



A ghostly troop, in pale amaze 
They melted 'neath that living gaze,- 
His in whose spirit's gusty blaze 

We seem to hear 
The crackling of their phantom bays 

Sapless and sear ! 



For, 'mid an age of dust and dearth. 

Once more had bloomed immortal worth. 

There, in the strong, splenetic North, 

The Spring began. 

A mighty mother had brought forth 

A mighty man. 
234 



THE TOMB OF BURNS 

No mystic torch through Time he bore, 
No virgin veil from Life he tore ; 
His soul no bright insignia wore 

Of starry birth ; 
He ssiw what all men see — no more — 

In heaven and earth : 



But as, when thunder crashes nigh, 
All darkness opes one flaming eye, 
And the world leaps against the sky, — 

So fiery-clear 
Did the old truths that we pass by 

To him appear. 

How could he 'scape the doom of such 

As feel the airiest phantom-touch 

Keenlier than others feel the clutch 

Of iron powers, — 

Who die of having lived so much 

In their large hours ? 
235 



THE TOMB OF BURNS 

He erred, he sinned : and if there be 
Who, from his hapless frailties free, 
Rich in the poorer virtues, see 

His faults alone, — 
To such, O Lord of Charity, 

Be mercy shown ! 



Singly he faced the bigot brood. 
The meanly wise, the feebly good ; 
He pelted them with pearl, with mud ; 

He fought them well, — 
But ah, the stupid million stood. 

And he — he fell ! 



All bright and glorious at the start, 

'Twas his ignobly to depart. 

Slain by his own too affluent heart. 

Too generous blood ; 

And blindly, having lost Life's chart, 

To meet Death's flood. 
236 



THE TOMB OF BURNS 

So closes the fantastic fray. 
The duel of the spirit and clay ! 
So come bewildering disarray 

And blurring gloom, 
The irremediable day 

And final doom. 



So passes, all confusedly 

As lights that hurry, shapes that flee 

About some brink we dimly see. 

The trivial, great. 
Squalid, majestic tragedy 

Of human fate. 



Not ours to gauge the more or less, 

The will's defect, the^blood's excess. 

The earthy humours that oppress 

The radiant mind. 

His greatness, not his littleness, 

Concerns mankind. 
237 



THE TOMB OF BURNS 

A dreamer of the common dreams, 
A fisher in familiar streams. 
He chased the transitory gleams 

That all pursue ; 
But on his Hps the eternal themes 

Again were new. 



With shattering ire or withering mirth 
He smote each worthless claim to worth. 
The barren fig-tree cumbering Earth 

He would not spare. 
Through ancient lies of proudest birth 

He drove his share. 



To him the Powers that formed him brave, 
Yet weak to breast the fatal wave, 
A mighty gift of Hatred gave, — 

A gift above 
All other gifts benefic, save 

The gift of Love. 

238 



THE TOMB OF BURNS 

He saw 'tis meet that Man possess 
The will to curse as well as bless. 
To pity — and be pitiless. 

To make, and mar ; 
The fierceness that from tenderness 

Is never far. 



And so his fierce and tender strain 
Lives, and his idlest words remain 
To flout oblivion, that in vain 

Strives to destroy 
One lightest record of his pain 

Or of his joy. 



And though thrice statelier names decay, 

His own can wither not away 

While plighted lass and lad shall stray 

Among the broom, 

Where evening touches glen and brae 

With rosy gloom ; 
239 



THE TOMB OF BURNS 

While Hope and Love with Youth abide ; 
While Age sits at the ingleside ; 
While yet there have not wholly died 

The heroic fires. 
The patriot passion, and the pride 

In noble sires ; 



While, with the conquering Teuton breed 
Whose fair estate of speech and deed 
Heritors north and south of Tweed 

Alike may claim, 
The dimly mingled Celtic seed 

Flowers like a flame ; 



While nations see in holy trance 

That vision of the world's advance 

Which glorified his countenance 

When from afar 

He hailed the Hope that shot o'er France 

Its crimson star ; 
240 



THE TOMB OF BURNS 

While, plumed for flight, the Soul deplores 
The cage that foils the wing that soars ; 
And while, through adamantine doors 

In dreams flung wide, 
We hear resound, on mortal shores. 

The immortal tide. 



!24l 



EPIGRAM 



T FOLLOW Beauty ; of her train am I : 

Beauty whose voice is earth and sea and air ; 

Who serveth, and her hands for all things ply ; 
Who reigneth, and her throne is everywhere. 



242 



SONNETS, Etc., 



FROM 



"THE YEAR OF SHAME" 



Three of the foUonvlng sonnets appeared also in the 
Author s pamphlet y " The Purple East.^^ 



FROM "THE YEAR OF SHAME" 



TO A LADY 

T^AUGHTER of Ireland^ — nay, 'twere better said. 

Daughter of Ireland's beauty, Ireland's grace, 

Child of her charm, of her romance ; whose face 

Is legendary with her glories fled ! 

The shadow of her living griefs and dead 

I pray you to put by a little space. 

And mourn with me an ancient Orient race 

Outcast and doomed and disinherited. 

Though Wrong be strong, though thrones be built 

on crimes, 
To know you. Lady, is to doubt no more 
That in the world are mightier powers than these ; 
That heaven, the ocean, gains on earth, the shore ; 
And that deformity and hate are Time's, 
And love and loveliness Eternity's. 



245 



FROM "THE YEAR OF SHAME" 



THE TIRED LION 

OPEAK once again, with that great note of 

thine, 
Hero withdrawn from Senates and their sound 
Unto thy home by Cambria's northern bound. 
Not always, not in all things, was it mine 
Speak once again, and wake a world supine. 
To follow where thou led'st : but who hath found 
Another man so shod with fire, so crowned 
With thunder, and so armed with wrath divine ? 
Lift up thy voice once more ! The nation's heart 
Is cold as Anatolia's mountains snows. 
Oh, from these alien paths of base repose 
Call back thy England, ere thou too depart — 
Ere, on some secret mission, thou too start 
With silent footsteps, whither no man knows. 

246 



FROM '^THE YEAR OF SHAME" 



THE KNELL OF CHIVALRY 

f\ VANISHED morn of crimson and of gold, 

youth of roselight and romance, wherein 

1 read of paynim and of paladin. 

And Beauty snatched from ogre's dungeoned 

hold! 
Ever the recreant would in dust be rolled, 
Ever the true knight in the joust would win, 
Ever the scaly shape of monstrous Sin 
At last lie vanquished, fold on writhing fold. 
Was it all false, that world of princely deeds. 
The splendid quest, the good fight ringing clear ? 
Yonder the Dragon ramps with fiery gorge. 
Yonder the victim faints and gasps and bleeds ; 
But in his merry England our St. George 
Sleeps a base sleep beside his idle spear. 

247 



FROM "THE YEAR OF SHAME" 



A TRIAL OF ORTHODOXY 

T^HE clinging children at their mother's knee 

Slain ; and the sire and kindred one by one 

Flayed or hewn piecemeal ; and things nameless 

done. 
Not to be told : while imperturbably 
The nations gaze, where Neva to the sea. 
Where Seine and Rhine, Tiber and Danube run, 
And where great armies glitter in the sun, 
And great kings rule, and man is boasted free ! 
What wonder if yon torn and naked throng 
Should doubt a Heaven that seems to wink and nod. 
And having moaned at noontide, " Lord, how long ? " 
Should cry, " Where hidest Thou ? " at evenfall. 
At midnight, " Is He deaf and blind, our God ? " 
And ere day dawn, " Is He indeed at all ? " 



248 



FROM "THE YEAR OF SHAME" 



TO THE SULTAN 

r^ALlFH, I did thee wrong. I hailed thee late 

"Abdul the Damned/' and would recall my word. 

It merged thee with the unillustrious herd 

Who crowd the approaches to the infernal gate — 

Spirits gregarious^ equal in their state 

As is the innumerable ocean bird, 

Gannet or gull, whose wandering plaint is heard 

On Ailsa or lona desolate. 

For, in a world where cruel deeds abound. 

The merely damned are legion : with such souls 

Is not each hollow and cranny of Tophet 

crammed ? 
Thou with the brightest of Hell's aureoles 
Dost shine supreme, incomparably crowned, 
Immortally, beyond all mortals, damned. 



249 



FROM "THE YEAR OF SHAME" 



ON THE REPORTED EXPULSION FROM 
FRANCE OF AHMED RIZA, 

A Disaffected Subject of the Sultan 

lA/^HEN, from supreme disaster^ France uprose. 
Shook her great wings and faced the world anew_, 
Who, if not we, rejoiced at heart to view 
Her proud resiUence after mightiest woes ? 
When 'neath the anarch's knife we saw the close 
Of Carnot's day, amid her weepings who 
Wept if not we, for the just man and true 
That masked his strength in most urbane repose ? 
And now again we mourn, but not with her. 
Nay, not with her, though for her ! — mourn to see 
A tyrant, Hell's most perfect minister, 
A man-fiend, sun him in her countenance ; 
And Freedom, whose impassioned name was France, 
Lie soiled and desecrate by France the Free. 

250 



FROM ^^THE YEAR OF SHAME" 



ON A CERTAIN EUROPEAN ALLIANCE 

npHE Hercules of nations^ shaggy-browed^ 
Enormous-limbedj supreme on Steppe and plain 
Dwelt without consort^ in his narrow brain 
Nursing wide dreams he might not dream aloud ; 
Till him the radiant western Venus vowed 
(So strange is love !) she pined for : and these twain 
Were wedded — Neptune, with his nereid-train. 
Gracing the pageant of their nuptials proud. 

Perfect in amorous arts, through eyes and ears 
She fans her giant's not too fierce desire. 
" How long, O Venus .^ What impassioned years, 
What ages of such rapture, ere thou tire } " 
Thus the lewd gods : thus Mars and all his peers, 
Gazing profane, at fault 'twixt mirth and ire. 



251 



FROM "THE YEAR OF SHAME" 



TO OUR SOVEREIGN LADY 

/^UEEN, that from Spring to Autumn of Thy reign 

Hast taught Thy people how 'tis queenlier far 

Than any golden pomp of peace or war, 

Simply to be a woman without stain ! 

Queen whom we love, Who lovest us again ! 

We pray that yonder, by Thy wild Braemar, 

The lord of many legions, the White Czar, 

At this red hour, hath tarried not in vain. 

We dream that from Thy words, perhaps Thy 

tears, 
Ev'n in the King's inscrutable heart, shall grow 
Harvest of succour, weal, and gentler days ! 
So shall Thy lofty name to latest years 
Still loftier sound, and ever sweetlier blow 
The rose of Thy imperishable praise. 



252 



FROM "THE YEAR OF SHAME" 



EUROPE AT THE PLAY 

/^ LANGUID audience, met to see 

The last act of the tragedy 

On that terrific stage afar. 

Where burning towns the footlights are, — 

O listless Europe, day by day 

Callously sitting out the play ! 

So sat, witli loveless count'nance cold. 

Round the arena, Rome of old. 

Pain, and the ebb of life's red tide. 

So, with a calm regard, she eyed, 

Her gorgeous vesture, million-pearled. 

Splashed with the blood of half the world. 

High was her glory's noon : as yet 

She had not dreamed her sun could set ! 
253 



FROM "THE YEAR OF SHAME" 

As yet she had not dreamed how soon 
Shadows should vex her glory's noon. 
Another's pangs she counted nought ; 
Of human hearts she took no thought ; 
But God, at nightfall, in her ear 
Thundered His thought exceeding clear. 

Perchance in tempest and in blight. 

On Europe, too, shall fall the night ! 

She sees the victim overborne. 

By worse than ravening lions torn. 

She sees, she hears, with soul unstirred. 

And lifts no hand, and speaks no word. 

But vaunts a brow like theirs who deem 

Men's wrongs a phrase, men's rights a dream. 

Yet haply she shall learn, too late. 

In some bUnd hurricane of Fate, 

How fierily alive the things 

She held as fool's imaginings. 

And, though circuitous and obscure. 

The feet of Nemesis how sure. 



254 



ESTRANGEMENT 



ESTRANGEMENT 

QX), without overt breach^ we fall apart, 

Tacitly sunder — neither you nor I 

Conscious of one intelligible Why, 

And both, from severance, winning equal smart. 

So, with resigned and acquiescent heart. 

Whene'er your name on some chance lip may lie, 

I seem to see an alien shade pass by, 

A spirit wherein I have no lot or part. 

Thus may a captive, in some fortress grim, 

From casual speech betwixt his warders, learn 

That June on her triumphal progress goes 

Through arched and bannered woodlands ; while for 

him 
She is a legend emptied of concern, 
And idle is the rumour of the rose. 



Q55 



EPIGRAM 



'T^HE gods man makes he breaks ; proclaims them 
each 

Immortal^ and himself outlives them all ; 
But whom he set not up he cannot reach 

To shake His cloud-dark sun-bright pedestal. 



256 



THE LOST EDEN 



THE LOST EDEN 

"DUT yesterday was Man from Eden driven. 
His dream, wherein he dreamed himself the first 
Of creatures, fashioned for eternity — 
This was the Eden that he shared with Eve. 

Eve, the adventurous soul within his soul ! 

The sleepless, the unslaked ! She showed him where 

Amidst his pleasance hung the bough whose fruit 

Is disenchantment and the perishing 

Of many glorious errors. And he saw 

His paradise how narrow : and he saw, — 

He, who had well-nigh deemed the world itself 

Of less significance and majesty 

Than his own part and business in it ! — how 

Little that part, and in how great a world. 

257 R 



THE LOST EDEN 

And an imperative world-thirst drave him forth, 
And the gold gates of Eden clanged behind. 

Never shall he return : for he hath sent 
His spirit abroad among the infinitudes, 
And may no more to the ancient pales recall 
The travelled feet. But oftentimes he feels 
The intolerable vastness bow him down, 
The awful homeless spaces scare his soul ; 
And half-regretful he remembers then 
His Eden lost, as some grey mariner 
May think of the far fields where he was bred. 
And woody ways unbreathed-on by the sea. 
Though more familiar now the ocean-paths 
Gleam, and the stars his fathers never knew. 



258 



EPIGRAM 



/^NWARD the chariot of the Untarrying moves ; 

Nor day divulges him nor night conceals ; 
Thou hear'st the echo of unreturning hooves 

And thunder of irrevocable wheels. 



259 



INVENTION 



INVENTION 

T ENVY not the Lark his song divine. 

Nor thee, O Maid, thy beauty's faultless 
mould. 
Perhaps the chief felicity is mine, 
Who hearken and behold. 

The joy of the Artificer Unknown 

Whose genius could devise the Lark and thee — 
This, or a kindred rapture, let me own, 
I covet ceaselessly ! 



260 



EPIGRAM 



T PLUCK'D this flower, O brighter flower, for thee 
There where the river dies into the sea. 
To kiss it the wild west wind hath made free : 
Kiss it thyself and give it back to me. 



261 



AN INSCRIPTION AT WINDERMERE 



AN INSCRIPTION AT WINDERMERE 

iT^UEST of this fair abode, before thee rise 

No summits vast, that icily remote 

Cannot forget their own magnificence 

Or once put off their kinghood ; but withal 

A confraternity of stateliest brows, 

As Alp or Atlas noble, in port and mien ; 

Old majesties, that on their secular seats 

Enthroned, are yet of affable access 

And easy audience, not too great for praise, 

Not arrogantly aloof from thy concerns. 

Not vaunting their indifference to thy fate. 

Nor so august as to contemn thy love. 

Do homage to these suavely eminent ; 

But privy to their bosoms wouldst thou be. 

There is a vale, whose seaward parted lips 
262 



AN INSCRIPTION AT WINDERMERE 

Murmur eternally some half-divulged 
Reluctant secret^ where thou may'st o'erhear 
The mountains interchange their confidences, 
Peak with his federate peak, that think aloud 
Their broad and lucid thoughts, in liberal day : 
Thither repair alone : the mountain heart 
Not two may enter ; thence returning, tell 
What thou hast heard ; and 'mid the immortal 

friends 
Of mortals, the selectest fellowship 
Of poets divine, place shall be found for thee. 



263 



SONG 



SONG 

APRIL, April, 
Laugh thy girUsh laughter ; 
Then, the moment after. 
Weep thy girlish tears ! 
April, that mine ears 
Like a lover greetest, 
If I tell thee, sweetest, 
All my hopes and fears, 
April, April, 

Laugh thy golden laughter. 
But, the moment after. 
Weep thy golden tears ! 



264 



EPIGRAM 



A H^ vain, thrice vain in the end, thy hate and rage, 
And the shrill tempest of thy clamorous page. 
True poets but transcendent lovers be. 
And one great love-confession poesy. 



265 



ELUSION 



ELUSION 

Tl/^HERE shall I find thee, Joy ? by what great 

marge 
With the strong seas exulting ? on what peaks 
Rapt ? or astray within what forest bourn. 
Thy light hands parting the resilient boughs ? 

Hast thou no answer ? . . . Ah, in mine own 

breast 
Except unsought thou spring, though I go forth 
And tease the waves for news of thee, and 

make 
Importunate inquisition of the woods 
If thou didst pass that way, I shall but find 
The brief print of thy footfall on sere leaves 
And the salt brink, and woo thy touch in vain. 



266 



EPIGRAM 



TMMURED in sense^ with fivefold bonds confined, 
Rest we content if whispers from the stars 

In waftings of the incalculable wind 

Come blown at midnight through our prison-bars. 



267 



TOO LATE 



TOO LATE 

T^OO late to say farewell. 
To turn, and fall asunder, and forget. 
And take up the dropped life of yesterday ! 
So ancient, so far-off, is yesterday. 
To the last hour ere I had kissed thy cheek ! 

Too late to say farewell. 



Too late to say farewell. 
Can aught remain hereafter as of old ? 
A touch, a tone hath changed the heaven and 

earth, 
And in a hand-clasp all begins anew. 
Somewhat of me is thine, of thee is mine. 

Too late to say farewell. 

268 



TOO LATE 

Too late to say farewell. 
We are not May-day masquers, thou and I ! 
We have lived deep life, we have drunk of tragic 

springs. 
Tis for light hearts to take light leave of love. 
But ah, for me, for thee, too late, dear Spirit ! 

Too late to say farewell. 



26'9 



THEY AND WE 



THEY AND WE 

VVriTH stormy joy^ from height on height, 

The thundering torrents leap. 
The mountain tops, with still delight, 

Their great inaction keep. 

Man only, irked by calm, and rent. 

By each emotion's throes. 
Neither in passion finds content, 

Nor finds it in repose. 



270 



EPIGRAM 



npHINK not thy wisdom can illume away 
The ancient tanglement of night and day. 
Enough^ to acknowledge both^ and both revere 
They see not clearliest who see all things clear. 



271 



THE HEIGHTS AND THE DEEPS 



THE HEIGHTS AND THE DEEPS 

'T^HIS is the summit, wild and lone. 
Westward the Cumbrian mountains stand. 
Let me look eastward on mine own 
Ancestral land. 

O sing me songs, O tell me tales, 
Of yonder valleys at my feet ! 
She was a daughter of these dales, 
A daughter sweet. 

Oft did she speak of homesteads there, 
And faces that her childhood knew. 
She speaks no more ; and scarce I dare 

To deem it true, 

272 



THE HEIGHTS AND THE DEEPS 

That somehow she can still behold 
Sunlight and moonlight, earth and sea. 
Which were among the gifts untold 
She gave to me. 



27.S 



THE CAPTIVE'S DREAM 



THE CAPTIVE'S DREAM 

T^ROM birth we have his captives been 

For freedom^ vain to strive ! 

This is our chamber : windows five 

Look forth on his demesne ; 

And each to its own several hue 

Translates the outward scene. 

We cannot once the landscape view 

Save with the painted panes between. 



Ah, if there be indeed 

Beyond one darksome door a secret stair. 

That, winding to the battlements, shall lead 

Hence to pure light, free air ! 

This is the master hope, or the supreme despair. 



274 



TO MRS. HERBERT STUDD 



TO MRS. HERBERT STUDD 

AMID the billowing leagues of Sarum Plain 
I read the heroic songs^ which he, the bard * 
Of your own house and lineage, lovingly 
Hath fashioned, out of Ireland's deeds and dreams, 
And her far glories, and her ancient tears. 

The sheep-bells tinkled in the fold. Hard by, 
A whimpering pewit's desultory wing 
Made loneliness more manifestly lone. 

Friend, would you judge your poets, try them 
thus : 
Read them where rolls the moorland, or the main ! 
Not light is then their ordeal, so to stand 



Mr. Aubrey de Vere. 
275 



TO MRS. HERBERT STUDD 

Neighboured by these large natural Presences ; 
Nor transitory their honour, who, like him, 
No inch of spiritual stature lose, 
Measured against the eternal amplitudes, 
And tested by the clear and healthful sky. 



276 



THE UNKNOWN GOD 



THE UNKNOWN GOD 



YY/'HEN, overarched by gorgeous night, 

I wave my trivial self away ; 
When all I was to all men's sight 

Shares the erasure of the day ; 
Then do I cast my cumbering load, 
Then do I gain a sense of God. 



Not him that with fantastic boasts 

A sombre people dreamed they knew ; 

The mere barbaric God of Hosts 

That edged their sword and braced their thew 

A God they pitted 'gainst a swarm 

Of neighbour Gods less vast of arm ; 

277 



THE UNKNOWN GOD 

A God like some imperious king. 

Wroth, were his realm not duly awed 

A God for ever hearkening 

Unto his self-commanded laud ; 

A God for ever jealous grown 

Of carven wood and graven stone ; 



A God whose ghost, in arch and aisle, 
Yet haunts his temple — and his tomb ; 

But follows in a little while 
Odin and Zeus to equal doom ; 

A God of kindred seed and line ; 

Man's giant shadow, hailed divine. 



O streaming worlds, O crowded sky, 
O Life, and mine own soul's abyss. 

Myself am scarce so small that I 
Should bow to Deity like this ! 

This my Begetter ? This was what 

Man in his violent youth begot. 

278 



THE UNKNOWN GOD 

The God I know of, 1 shall ne'er 

Know, though he dwells exceeding nigh. 

Raise thou the stone andjind me there, 
Cleave thou the loood and there am I, 

Yea, in my flesh his spirit doth flow, 

Too near, too far, for me to know. 



Whate'er my deeds, I am not sure 
That I can pleasure him or vex : 

I that must use a speech so poor 
It narroAvs the Supreme with sex. 

Notes he the good or ill in man ? 

To hope he cares is all I can. 



I hope — with fear. For did I trust 
This vision granted me at birth. 

The sire of heaven would seem less just 
Than many a faulty son of earth. 

And so he seems indeed ! But then, 

I trust it not, this bounded ken. 
279 



THE UNKNOWN GOD 

And dreaming much, I never dare 
To dream that in my prisoned soul 

The flutter of a trembling prayer 

Can move the Mind that is the Whole. 

Though kneeling nations watch and yearn, 

Does the primordial purpose turn ? 



Best by remembering God, say some. 
We keep our high imperial lot. 

Fortune, I fear, hath oftenest come 
When we forgot — when we forgot ! 

A lovelier faith their happier crown. 

But history laughs and weeps it down ! 



Know they not well, how seven times seven. 
Wronging our mighty arms with rust, 

We dared not do the work of heaven 
Lest heaven should hurl us in the dust ? 

The work of heaven ! 'Tis waiting still 

The sanction of the heavenly will. 
280 



THE UNKNOWN GOD 

Unmeet to be profaned by praise 
Is he whose coils the world enfold ; 

The God on whom I ever gaze, 
The God I never once behold : 

Above the cloud, beneath the clod : 

The Unknown God, the Unknown God. 



281 



TO THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH 



TO THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH 

In Answer to his Sonnet " On Reading ^ The 
Purple East 

TDLE the churlish leagues 'twixt you and me, 
Singer most rich in charm, most rich in grace ! 
What though I cannot see you face to face ? 
Allow my boast^ that one in blood are we ! 
One by that secret consanguinity 
Which binds the children of melodious race, 
And knows not the fortuities of place. 
And cold interposition of the sea. 
You are my noble kinsman in the lyre : 
Forgive the kinsman's freedom that I use. 
Adventuring these imperfect thanks, who late. 
Singing a nation's woe, in wonder and ire,— 
Against me half the wise and all the great, — 
Sang not alone, for with me was your muse. 



282 



THE HOPE OF THE WORLD 



THE HOPE OF THE WORLD 



TTIGHER than heaven they sit, 

Life and her consort Law ; 
And One whose countenance lit 

In mine more perfect awe, 
I fain had deemed their peer, 

Beside them throned above : 
Ev'n him who casts out fear, 

Unconquerable Love. 
Ah, 'twas on earth alone that I his beauty saw. 



II 



On earth, in homes of men. 
In hearts that crave and die. 



283 



THE HOPE OF THE WORLD 

Dwells he not also, then, 

With Godhead, throned on high ? 
This and but this I know : 

His face I see not there : 
Here find I him below, 
Nor find him otherwhere ; 
Born of an aching world. Pain's bridegroom. 
Death's ally. 



Ill 

Did Heaven vouchsafe some sign 

That through all Nature's frame 
Boundless ascent benign 

Is everywhere her aim. 
Such as man hopes it here. 

Where he from beasts hath risen, — 
Then might I read full clear, 

Ev'n in my sensual prison. 

That Life and Law and Love are one symphonious 

name. 

284 



THE HOPE OF THE WORLD 



IV 

Such sign hath Heaven yet lent ? 

Nay, on this earth, are we 
So sure 'tis real ascent 

And inmost gain we see ? 
'Gainst Evil striving still, 

Some spoils of war we wrest : 
Not to discover 111 

Were haply state as blest. 
We vaunt, o'er doubtful foes, a dubious victory. 



In cave and bosky dene 
Of old there crept and ran 

The gibbering form obscene 
That was and was not man. 

With fairer covering clad 

The desert beasts went by ; 
285 



THE HOPE OF THE WORLD 

The coucliant lion had 
More speculative eye, 
And goodlier speech the birds, than we when we 
began. 

VI 

A flattering dream were this — 

That Earth, from primal bloom, 
With pangs of prescient bliss 

Divined us in her womb ; 
That fostering powers have made 

Our fate their secret care. 
And wooed us, grade by grade. 

Up winding stair on stair : 
But not for golden fancies iron truths make room. 



VII 

Rather, some random throw 

Of heedless Nature's die 

'Twould seem, that from so low 

Hath lifted man so high. 
286 



THE HOPE OF THE WORLD 

Through untold aeons vast 
She let him lurk and cower : 

'Twould seem he climbed at last 
In mere fortuitous hour^ 
Child of a thousand chances 'neath the indifferent sky. 

VIII 

A soul so long deferred 

In his blind brain be bore, 
It might have slept unstirred 

Ten million noontides more. 
Yea, round him Darkness might 

Till now her folds have drawn, 
O'er that enormous night 

So casual came the dawn, 
Such hues of hap and hazard Man's Emergence wore ! 

IX 

If, then, our rise from gloom 

Hath this capricious air. 
What ground is mine to assume 

An upward process there, 

287 



THE HOPE OF THE WORLD 

In yonder worlds that shine 
From ahen tracts of sky ? 
Nor ground to assume is mine 
Nor warrant to deny. 
Equal, my source of hope, my reason for despair. 



And thougli within me here 

Hope lingers unsubdued, 
'Tis because airiest cheer 

SuHices for her food ! 
As some adventurous flower, 

On savage crag-side grown, 
Seems nourished hour by hour 

From its wild self alone. 
So lives inveterate Hope, on her own hardihood. 

XI 

She tells me, whispering low : 

" Wherefore and whence thou wast, 
Thou shalt behold and know 

When the great bridge is crossed. 

288 



THE HOPE OF THE WORLD 

For not in mockery He 

Thy gift of wondering gave^ 

Nor bade thine answer be 
The blank stare of the grave. 
Thou shalt behold and know ; and find again thy lost." 

XII 

With rapt eyes fixed afar. 

She tells me : " Throughout Space, 
God ward each peopled star 

Runs with thy Earth a race. 
Wouldst have the goal so nigh, 

The course so smooth a field. 
That Triumph should thereby 

One half its glory yield ? 
And can Life's pyramid soar all apex and no base ?" 

XIII 

She saith : '' Old dragons lie 

In bowers of pleasance curled ; 

And dost thou ask me why .^ 

It is a Wizard's world ! 

289 T 

J 



THE HOPE OF THE WORLD 

Enchanted princes these, 

Who yet their scales shall cast, 
And through his sorceries 
Die into kings at last. 
Ambushed in Winter's heart the rose of June is 
furled." 

XIV 

Such are the tales she tells : 

Who trusts, the happier he : 
But nought of virtue dwells 

In that felicity ! 
I think the harder feat 

Were his who should withstand 
A voice so passing sweet. 

And so profuse a hand. — 
Hope, I forego the wealth thou fling' st abroad so 
free ! 



XV 



Carry thy largesse hence, 

Light Giver ! Let me learn 
290 



THE HOPE OF THE WORLD 

To abjure the opulence 

I have done nought to earn ; 

And on this world no more 
To cast ignoble slight, 

Counting it but the door 

Of other worlds more bright. 
Here, where I fail or conquer, here is ray concern : 



XVI 

Here, where perhaps alone 

I conquer or I fail. 
Here, o'er the dark Deep blown, 

I ask no perfumed gale ; 
I ask the unpampering breath 

That fits me to endure 
Chance, and victorious Deatli, 

Life, and my doom obscure, 
Who know not whence I am sped, nor to what port 
I sail. 



291 



AFTER DEFEAT 



AFTER DEFEAT^ 

TDRAY, what chorus this ? At the tragedy's end, 
what chorus ? 

Surely bewails it the brave, the unhappily starred, 
the abandoned 

Sole unto fate, by yonder invincible kin of the 
vanquished ? 

Surely salutes it the fallen, not mocks the pro- 
tagonist prostrate ? 



Hark. " Make merry. Ye dreamed that a monster 

sickened : behold him 
Rise, new-fanged. Make merry. A hero troubled 

and shamed you. 

* Written at the close of the Grseco- Turkish War. 
292 



AFTER DEFEAT 

Jousting in desperate lists, he is trodden of giants 

in armour. 
Mighty is Night. Make merry. The Dawn for a 

season is frustrate." 

Thus, after all these ages, a paean, a loud jubilation, 
Mounts, from peoples bemused, to a heaven refrain- 
ing its thunder. 



293 



TO THE LADY KATHARINE MANNERS 



TO THE LADY KATHARINE MANNERS 
(With a Volume of the Author's Poems) 

/^N lake and fell the loud rains beat^ 
And August closes rough and rude. 

'Twas Summer's whim, to counterfeit 
The wilder hours her hours prelude. 

And soon — pathetic last device 

Of greatness dead and puissance flown ! — 
She passes to her couch with thrice 

The pomp of coming to her throne. 

But while, by mountain and by mere, 

Summer and you are hovering yet, 

A vagrant Muse entreats your ear : 

Forgive her ; and not quite forget ! 
294< 



TO THE LADY KATHARINE MANNERS 

I would that nobler songs than these 
Her hands might proffer to your hands. 

I would their notes were as the sea's ; 
I know their faults are as the sands. 

At least she prompts no vulgar strain ; 

At least are noble themes her choice ; 
Nor hath she oped her lips in vain, 

For you take pleasure in her voice. 

And she hath known the mountain-spell ; 

The sky-enchantment hath she known. 
It was her vow that she would dwell 

With greatest things, or dwell alone. 

And various though her mundane lot, 

She counts herself benignly starred, — 
All her vicissitudes forgot 
In your regard. 

Windermere, August 1897. 

295 



JUBILEE NIGHT IN WESTMORLAND 



JUBILEE NIGHT IN WESTMORLAND 

T^H ROUGH that majestic and sonorous day. 

When London was one gaze on her own joy, 

I walked where yet is silence undeflowered, 

In the lone places of the fells and meres ; 

And afterward ascended, night being come. 

To where, high on a salient coign of crag, 

Fuel was heaped as on some altar old 

Whose immemorial priests propitiated 

With unrecorded rites forgotten gods. 

Darkly along the ridge the village folk 

Had gathered, waiting till the unborn fire 

Should, from its durance in the mother pine. 

Leap ; and anon was given the signal : thrice 

A mimic meteor hissed aloft, and fell 

All jewels, while the wondering hound that couched 

296 



JUBILEE NIGHT IN WESTMORLAND 

Beside me lifted up his head and bayed 

At the strange portent, with a voice that called 

Far echoes forth_, out of the hollow vales. 

Then the piled timber blazed against the clouds, 

Roaring, and oft, a monstrous madcap, shook 

Hilarious sides, and showered ephemeral gold. 

And one by one the mountain peaks forswore 

Their vowed impassiveness, the mountain peaks 

Confessed emotion, and I saw these kings 

Doing perfervid homage to a Queen. 

Long watched I, and at last to the sweet dale 

Went down, with thoughts of two great women, 

thoughts 

Of two great women who have ruled this land ; 

Of her that mirrored a fantastic age. 

The imperious, vehement, abounding Spirit, 

Mightily made, but gusty as those winds, 

Her wild allies that broke the spell of Spain ; 

And her who sways, how silently ! a world 

Dwarfing the glorious Tudor's queenliest dreams ; 

Who, to her well-nigh more than mortal task. 

Hath brought the strength-in-sweetness that prevails, 

297 



JUBILEE NIGHT IN WESTMORLAND 

The regal will that royally can yield : 
Mistress of many peoples, heritress 
Of many thrones, wardress of many seas ; 
But destined, more melodiously than thus, 
To be hereafter and for ever hailed, 
When our imperial legend shall have fired 
The lips of sage and poet, and when these 
Shall, to an undispersing audience, sound 
No sceptred name so winningly august 
As Thine, my Queen, Victoria the Beloved ! 



298 



BACH, IN THE FUGUES AND PRELUDES 



BACH, IN THE FUGUES AND PRELUDES 

/CONTENTEDLY with strictest strands confined, 
Sports in the sun that oceanic mind : 
To leap their bourn these waves did never long, 
Or roll against the stars their rockbound song. 



299 



APOLOGIA 



APOLOGIA 

T^HUS much I know : what dues soe'er be 

mine, 

Of fame or of oblivion. Time the just, 

Punctiliously assessing, shall award. 

This have I doubted never ; this is sure. 

But one meanwhile shall chide me, — one shall 

curl 

Superior lips, — because my handiwork, 

The issue of my solitary toil. 

The harvest of my spirit, even these 

My numbers, are not something, good or ill. 

Other than I have ever striven, in years 

Lit by a conscious and a patient aim. 

With hopes and with despairs, to fashion them ; 

Or, it may be, because I have full oft 

300 



APOLOGIA 

In singers* selves found me a theme of song^ 

Holding these also to be very part 

Of Nature's greatness, and accounting not 

Their descants least heroical of deeds ; 

Or, yet again, because I bring nought new. 

Save as each noontide or each Spring is new. 

Into an old and iterative world. 

And can but proffer unto whoso will 

A cool and nowise turbid cup, from wells 

Our fathers digged; and have not thought it 

shame 
To tread in nobler footprints than mine own, 
And travel by the light of purer eyes. 
Ev'n such offences am I charged withal. 
Till, breaking silence, I am moved to cry. 
What would ye, then, my masters ? Is the 

Muse 

Fall'n to a thing of Mode, that must each year 

Supplant her derelict self of yester-year ? 

Or do the mighty voices of old days 

At last so tedious grow, that one whose lips 

Inherit some far echo of their tones — 

301 



APOLOGIA 

How far, how faint, none better knows than he 

Who hath been nourished on their utterance 

— can 

But irk the ears of such as care no more 

The accent of dead greatness to recall ? 

If, with an ape's ambition, I rehearse 

Their gestures, trick me in their stolen robes. 

The sorry mime of their nobility, 

Dishonouring whom I vainly emulate. 

The poor imposture soon shall shrink revealed 

In the ill grace with which their gems bestar 

An abject brow ; but if I be indeed 

Their true descendant, as the veriest hind 

May yet be sprung of kings, their lineaments 

Will out, the signature of ancestry 

Leap unobscured, and somewhat of themselves 

In me, their lowly scion, live once more. 

With grateful, not vainglorious joy, I dreamed 

It did so live ; and ev'n such pride was mine 

As is next neighbour to humility. 

For he that claims high lineage yet may feel 

How thinned in the transmission is become 

302 



APOLOGIA 

The ancient blood he boasts; how slight he 

stands 
In the great shade of his majestic sires. 
But it was mine endeavour so to sing 
As if these lofty ones a moment stooped 
From their still spheres, and undisdainful graced 
My note with audience, nor incurious heard 
Whether, degenerate irredeemably. 
The faltering minstrel shamed his starry kin. 
And though I be to these but as a knoll 
About the feet of the high mountains, scarce 
Remarked at all save when a valley cloud 
Holds the high mountains hidden, and the knoll 
Against the cloud shows briefly eminent ; 
Yet ev'n as they, I too, with constant heart. 
And with no light or careless ministry, 
Have served what seemed the Voice ; and un- 

profane. 

Have dedicated to melodious ends 

All of myself that least ignoble was. 

For though of faulty and of erring walk, 

I have not suffered aught in me of frail 

303 



APOLOGIA 

To blur my song ; I have not paid the world 

The evil and the insolent courtesy 

Of offering it my baseness for a gift. 

And unto such as think all Art is cold. 

All music unimpassioned, if it breathe 

An ardour not of Eros' lips_, and glow 

With fire not caught from Aphrodite's breast. 

Be it enough to say, that in Man's life 

Is room for great emotions unbegot 

Of dalliance and embracement, unbegot 

Ev'n of the purer nuptials of the soul ; 

And one not pale of blood, to human touch 

Not tardily responsive, yet may know 

A deeper transport and a mightier thrill 

Than comes of commerce with mortality, 

When, rapt from all relation with his kind. 

All temporal and immediate circumstance. 

In silence, in the visionary mood 

That, flashing light on the dark deep, perceives 

Order beyond this coil and errancy, 

Isled from the fretful hour he stands alone 

And hears the eternal movement, and beholds 

304. 



APOLOGIA 

Above him and around and at his feet, 
In million-billowed consentaneousnesS;, 
The flowing, flowing, flowing of the world. 

Such moments, are they not the peaks of life ? 

Enough for me, if on these pages fall 

The shadow of the summits, and an air 

Not dim^from human hearth-fires sometimes blow. 



THE END 



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Edinburgh 6^ London 

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